


Ethereal

by Lady_of_the_Spirit



Category: X-Men (Alternate Timeline Movies), X-Men - All Media Types, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Armando Muñoz Lives, BAMF Moira, BAMF Women, Canon-Typical Violence, Caring, Charles Being Concerned, Charles had bad parents, Don't touch her kids, Erik Has Feelings, Erik has Issues, Erik just doesn't want another kid to lose his mom, Female Friendship, Female Protagonist, Gen, Honestly Charles What Are You Thinking, Marianne is a book nerd, Marianne just really loves Sean, Maternal Instinct, Moira is appreciated like she should be, Mother Figures, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Mother-Son Relationship, Original Character-centric, Original Female Character(s) - Freeform, Platonic Female/Male Relationships, Platonic Relationships, Protective Erik Lehnsherr, Protective Marianne, Women Being Awesome, X-Mom Marianne
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-08
Updated: 2020-03-01
Packaged: 2020-03-08 17:56:03
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 10
Words: 38,716
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18899710
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lady_of_the_Spirit/pseuds/Lady_of_the_Spirit
Summary: "So, what do you say, love?""No."In which a woman refuses to save the world, on the grounds that she has more important things to do.Marianne Ouellet has a life. She has responsibilities. She has her bookstore and her son to look after. When two men break into her store after hours and tell her they have powers like hers, that they're assembling a team to take down a man starting a third world war, she has to refuse.Then she changes her mind.She still has to wait and see if it was a good decision. But it has to be. She can't risk her life for anything less.





	1. Vellichor

The wistfulness of a used bookshop.

* * *

It is a truth universally acknowledged that one can never read all of the books a bookstore has to offer. No matter how small the store is, nor how thin the books, there will always be new books to add to the shelves. There will always be old books you wish to reread, whether in small sections or the entire tome. There will always be books you cannot read, if they come in languages you do not know, or if you simply do not have the patience to go through a particularly boring book. There will always be books sold before you have a chance to even look at the title. You can never read all of the books in a bookstore.

It's a sad sort of realization that all lovers of books must come too; especially if you are the owner of a bookstore. But Marianne had long since made peace with this, and did not allow herself to grieve too much for the books she would never read. She instead focused on reading what she could, and owning a bookstore certainly allowed one time to do so.

In other forms of distraction, she focused on getting other people to read, especially the younger generation. The adults who didn't read were useless and she had no patience for them. The little ones, she loved. They were always eager and ready to learn what they could, to know more of the world they lived in. Her husband had once teasingly called her a siren, the way she called the children of their neighbourhood into her bookstore with her intriguing French accent and French pastries fresh from the oven. She had always lightly smacked him in the arm with the newspaper.

While it was true that might have been why the children came, she knew the reason they kept coming back was that they believed she had magic.

A belief which was not completely wrong.

But really, it all depended on how a person defined 'magic'.

 

 


	2. Establish

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which we officially meet Marianne and some things about her life are established.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> French Translations  
> Comment ça va : How are you  
> Mieux, maintenant que je suis ici : Better, now that I'm here
> 
> Anything in italics and underlined is spoken in French, even if written in English.

To make stable or firm; to confirm.

* * *

Her fingers ran over the edge of the page, running down the sharp corners of the pages. Books were one of her true loves - the feel of them, the smell of them, the sight of them, all were enough to make her happy when she was alone. _It is a shame,_ she thought every day, _not everyone thinks the same._ But what could she do? She could hardly force people to love reading as she did. (A hopeless cause, anyway; no one could love reading as much as she did.) All she could do was continue to sell her books and hope each book made a difference to someone; each book would be the one to change someone's life.

She knew for a fact one book she had sold had changed two people's lives, for the better.

The bell on the front door jingled as the door opened, followed closely a cheerful voice calling, "Hey, Mrs. O!"

A grin formed on her beautiful face, and she looked up to see her favourite customer turning a corner around the bookshelf at the front of the store. "Good morning, Sean," she greeted him. " _Comment ça va?_ "

 _" Mieux, maintenant que je suis ici._" The redhead grinned cheekily at her as he finally reached the front desk. He leaned against it, managing to find somewhere on her crowded desk (stacks of books; papers; a basket of green apples; a bell to ring for assistance if she couldn't be found) he could place his elbow.

"Flatterer," she scolded, though her deep blue eyes twinkled in amusement.

"Only stating the truth," Sean said, shrugging his shoulders.

"That does bring up an interesting question, though," she said. She made sure to place the ribbon she used as a bookmark in the book before she closed it and placed it beside her on a stack of more books. She looked back to Sean, eyes narrowed. "Why are you here today? You have classes, don't you?"

Sean suddenly found it hard to make eye contact with her. He took an apple from the basket on her counter, making a big show of shining it on his shirt. Marianne frowned at him.

"Sean," she said, "you are so lucky to be able to have an education. Other people do not have the same luck as you. Surely you realize that."

Sean nodded, taking a bite of his apple. He still wouldn't look at her.

"I don't care if the class is boring - you have a class and you should take it. Take advantage of being able to learn."

"Yeah, yeah, I know," Sean mumbled, a chunk of green apple in his mouth. He was looking down at his shirt now, playing with the hem.

He looked abashed, and she sighed. "Why are you gracing me with your presence today, then?" Marianne asked, her voice gentler now than it had been before.

It seemed he couldn't stay guilty forever, because he looked up at her with a grin. "It's my sister's birthday today."

Marianne gasped and clapped her hands together excitedly, smiling hugely. Marianne had never met Sean's little sister. Sean usually got books to read to her, and all of them were suggestions from Marianne. But Sean talked about Theresa enough that Marianne felt as though she already knew her. She could remember how excited Sean had been when his mother was pregnant - when his parents told him, he had burst into her store in the middle of the day, yelling "I'm gonna be a brother!" (She nearly stabbed herself with her letter opener, she had been so startled.) When Theresa had been born, he once again burst in on her, yelling "I HAVE A LITTLE SISTER!" (Though luckily this time she had been holding no sharp objects.) The significant age difference between him and Theresa (almost twelve years) made no negative impact on their relationship, as far as Marianne could tell, and he spent a lot of his time helping his parents or coming to Marianne for advice on small children and little siblings. Marianne gave him advice, soothed his worries, and suggested book after book for him to read to his sister. He took all of her advice with few objections.

"Wonderful!" She exclaimed. "How old is she turning?"

"She can tell you herself! She's right-" Sean looked down at the floor, frowned, and then looked around. "She's gone."

"Oh?" Marianne stood from her chair.

"Not a problem. Theresa!" Sean yelled. The response was a small thudding noise that came from one of the rows between Marianne's many bookshelves. "I found her," Sean said to her, and she smiled fondly at him.

A moment later, a young girl, maybe five or six, appeared out from between two bookshelves. (Marianne knew the section over there to be History: Europe. There were many fine books in that section. There were many fine books in every section.) The girl looked like a younger, female version of Sean, with the same wavy red hair, the same oval-shaped face, and the same spindly limbs Sean had possessed at her age.

"Theresa," Sean said again, gesturing her over to him, "come meet Mrs. O."

After a moment's hesitation, Theresa walked over to her brother. She joined him, and at once she had hidden behind him.

"This is my little sister, Theresa," Sean said as he crouched down beside the smaller version of himself. "Hey, Tree, can you tell Mrs. O how old you are today?"

Theresa clasped her hands together behind her back, turning her body from side to side. She shook her head 'no'.

"She turned six today," Sean said, looking up at Marianne, who had walked around her counter to get a better look at the child.

"Six?" Marianne repeated, eyes wide in surprise. She slowly lowered herself to the floor, careful not to startle the little girl before her. " _Un bon âge!_ Such a good age. You must be about to start school, then?"

Theresa was looking at her with an expression Marianne had seen on the faces of children many times before. It was a look of both awe and curiosity, and it never failed to make Marianne smile.

Theresa nodded, putting her hands to her face. "I'm in kindergarten," she said, and her voice was so sweet Marianne wanted to cry. "I know my ABC's and can count to thirty."

"You're so smart!" Marianne praised. Sean grinned at her; Theresa smiled shyly, revealing a small gap in her bottom row of teeth.

"You're really pretty," Theresa told her, "like a princess. And your voice is nice. I like it."

Marianne loved children for exactly this reason. They said whatever they thought, the moment they thought it. Marianne knew she was beautiful, and she didn't need others to say it to know it herself, but she still enjoyed hearing it - especially from children, who were too young to have any ulterior motives for saying things like that. And she loved hearing Theresa liked her voice; her French accent was still very strong, despite her years spent in America, and it was something of an oddity in her city.

 _" Merci beaucoup,_ Theresa. That was very kind of you to say," she told her.

"What does that mean?"

"It means, thank you very much." Marianne looked at Sean, who's smile had been growing as he watched the interaction between his little sister and Marianne. "Now, why did you bring her to me?"

"Because it's her birthday-"

"Oh, I forgot!" Marianne turned back to Theresa. "Happy birthday, Theresa!"

"Thank you, Mrs. O!" Theresa chirped, and she sounded so much like her brother at that moment.

"I wanted to do something special for her," Sean finished, after the interruption. "She can read by herself now, can't you, Tree?"

"I can."

_" Incroyable!"_

"That means incredible, Tree," Sean told Theresa, who nodded in understanding. "I wanted to get her a book, so she could get better at reading by herself, and so I-"

"You thought I could find her a book," Marianne finished for him.

Sean shrugged. "You're the only bookstore owner I know."

"Is that the only reason?" She asked, pretending to sound offended.

Sean grinned. "You're the only person I would trust with this choice."

Well, then. Marianne smiled. She couldn't turn down a compliment like that.

"The comic books are where they always are," Marianne said as she stood up. She brushed off any dirt that might have gotten on her pastel blue skirt.

"Awesome!" Sean gave her a thumbs up. He stood up as well and ruffled Theresa's hair. "Tree, you behave for Mrs. O, alright?"

"I will," Theresa promised, and the siblings high-fived before Sean stalked off to his comics.

Marianne sighed. "I keep insisting he read real books and he never listens to me," she said to Theresa. "All he reads is comics like Captain America, or whatever else is popular now." Yet Marianne continued to buy them, only for her most loyal customer. Used, of course - it was a used bookstore, after all. There were some books that came to her brand new, and she accepted them, but in general, her store mainly revolved around used books.

"Comic books are dumb," Theresa said, frowning. "They're full of boys. And boys are dumb."

Marianne couldn't help but laugh. "Very true, Theresa, but you'll find that some boys are dumber than most. It's rare to find a man who isn't a little bit of a buffoon."

"What's 'buffoon' mean?"

A smile found its way onto her face. "Dumb."

Theresa smiled at her. Marianne put her hand to her chin and looked around her store, deep in thought. "What would be good?" She wondered aloud. She looked down. "What would you like?" When Theresa only shrugged, she went back to looking around. _She was in the history section - but perhaps that was just a place to hide, if she wanted a history book she would have said that. Perhaps stick with the classics - yes, that's best. So, what then? Oh, not The Hobbit, she's a bit too young for that. Grimm's Fairy Tales are a bit too dark._ She winced a bit, remembering when she had read Grimm's Fairy Tales at seven years old. Nightmares had followed for days. _Definitely not. Still, fairy tales... Ah!_

"I know just the book for you, darling," Marianne said to Theresa. She headed for the children's section, high heels clicking against the wooden floorboards. Theresa followed close behind, eyes glued to the loose bun pinned up at the crown of Marianne's head. Several strands of fair blonde hair were falling from the bun, but to Theresa, it only made the beautiful woman look even more like a princess.

The children's section was located in the left wing of the store, and as they walked through the maze of bookshelves, Theresa found herself in awe of everything around her. When they reached their destination, while Marianne searched the shelves for the book she was looking for, Theresa studied her surroundings.

"Why do you have so many books?" Theresa asked, looking up at the tall shelves.

"Because I love to read, and I love to encourage reading in others. But sometimes people are not satisfied with any regular book - they have particular tastes. And I try to get as many books as I can, to keep everyone who comes into my store happy," Marianne answered, brushing her fingertips over the differently coloured book spines. She had to find just the right one.

"Have you ever read all the books in here?"

Marianne sighed wistfully. "If only. No, I've never been able to read all of these precious books. There are too many, and not all of them interest me enough to finish them. 'Tis a shame, really." She took a step back, looking to the very top shelf, a few feet over her head. "Have you ever heard of Hans Christian Anderson, Theresa?"

Theresa shook her head, 'no'.

"Truly?" Marianne gave a small frown as she turned back to the small girl. "What does anyone teach you if not the most important things?"

When Theresa merely shrugged, she sighed, shaking her head. "Such a shame. Hans Christian Anderson was a wonderful author from Denmark. My mother read his stories to me when I was your age, I think you'd enjoy them." Marianne gave a small, sad smile at the memory. _Non , no dwelling on that,_ she chided herself.

"What does he write about?" Theresa asked curiously, looking up at the tall woman.

A smile lit up Marianne's face at the question. Theresa smiled in return, happy to have made the pretty woman smile and make her look even prettier.

"He writes fairy tales. Wonderful, beautiful, tragic fairy tales. _The Little Mermaid_ , for instance - beautiful, but very sad. But I won't spoil it for you. Where is it?" Marianne grumbled the last bit, dark blue eyes narrowed as she searched for the book she desired. Finally, her eyes landed on the spine of a thick red book, tucked between two much thinner books, and she smiled at the sight of her prize. "Found it."

She looked behind her, to make sure Theresa was watching. The little girl was staring up at her, eyes wide as she waited for Marianne to reach up and get the book. "Do you need a ladder?" She asked curiously. Marianne was, after all, a few feet shorter than the top shelf, where the book was. She couldn't reach it all by herself.

Marianne only smiled. She looked back to the top shelf, eyeing the red book.

It took only a small tug of her mind to pull it free from the shelf. It hovered in the air for a moment, before floating towards the ground. Marianne gently grasped the book and pulled it towards her chest, eyes tracing the cover fondly as she turned back to Theresa. The little redhead was openly gaping, eyes huge and shining with amazement as Marianne crouched down in front of her.

Marianne presented the scarlet red book to Theresa. Golden letters, written in loopy cursive, were stamped on the cover, spelling out ' _The Works of Hans Christian Andersen'_. "Beautiful, isn't it?" Marianne said softly. When Theresa didn't respond, the cover suddenly opened without Marianne touching it. The pages of the book followed, turning over and over and giving Theresa glimpses of beautiful illustrations of the stories within, before finally landing on a particular page in the middle of the book. The picture on the page opposite the story was of a woman with a shepherds staff, and a man in a suit and a tall hat.

"This story," Marianne said, her fingers tracing the edge of the page with great care, "is my favourite. It is called 'The Shepherdess and the Chimney Sweep'. When you've finished reading the book, tell me which is your favourite, _oui_?"

Theresa reached out her small, trembling hands and took the book from a softly smiling Marianne. "Alright," she squeaked.

"I hope my trick did not frighten you," Marianne said, frowning.

Theresa shook her head fiercely, her red curls flying wildly. "You're magic," she said in a hushed voice, eyes shining with amazement.

Marianne chuckled. "I suppose I am." She stood back up, once again brushing dirt off her skirt. "Let's go find that brother of yours, shall we?"

Theresa gave a nod, still wide-eyed. She wrapped her arms around the thick book and followed Marianne to the comic book section. When they found Sean, sitting cross-legged on the floor and between two stacks of comics, Theresa ran around Marianne and threw herself into her brother's shoulder. "Sean!"

Sean let out a grunt of pain as the heavy book slammed into his shoulder, but quickly recovered. "Hey, there, Tree!" He grinned at her. "What did Mrs. O get for you?"

"This one," Theresa said, lifting the book to show him. "Sean, Mrs. O is magic!"

Sean gave Marianne a wink, which she returned with a smile. "Oh, is she?" Sean asked, looking back down at Theresa. "What did she do?"

"She floated this book down from the very top shelf!" Theresa exclaimed, bouncing on the balls of her feet. "And I saw it! And the book opened by itself! She's magic!"

"Let me see." Sean gestured for Theresa to hand him the book, which she did somewhat reluctantly. He examined the cover, read the title out loud, and began flipping through the pages. "This looks like a good one," he said. "Knew I could count on you."

"You flatter me," Marianne sighed, putting a hand to her face in a show of mock bashfulness.

"Can I read it when we get home?" Theresa asked, leaning against Sean's arm and looking down at the pages.

"If you think you can handle it. Think you can handle it?"

"Yes!"

"Then, yes, you can read it when we get home!" Sean exclaimed. Theresa giggled in delight. Marianne's heart melted at the sound. "Just hold on, I gotta clean these up first, then we can go." Sean began putting his comic books back onto the shelf, making sure to follow Marianne's alphabetical system.

"Sean and Mommy and Daddy are taking me to the aquarium today," Theresa informed Marianne. "They said Sean could take me here to get my present and then we would go later."

"The aquarium?" Marianne repeated. "That sounds fun! You must come back and tell me how it goes."

"I will! Sean, we have to come back and tell Mrs. O how much fun the aquarium is!"

"Will do." Sean nodded seriously, but the corners of his mouth were twitching. He stood up when he had finished putting the comics back onto the shelf, holding two comics for himself. Marianne led the siblings back to the front desk, where she rang up their items. When Sean paid her, she insisted on the Andersen book being on the house.

"It's a present," she insisted. "From me to my favourite customer."

"But it's not even for me," Sean said, still trying to get her to take the money.

"For my future favourite customer, then." Try as he might, Sean couldn't get her to take the money, and so eventually he gave up. Marianne smiled when he did.

She also recommended a book for him. " _The Hobbit_ is a wonderful read, I'm sure you'd like it. And Theresa will like it too, maybe once she's a little older." Sean promised to come back and get it some other time, and with a final wave goodbye and "Happy birthday!" for Theresa, the Cassidy siblings were gone.

* * *

When the final customer left, she locked the door behind them and switched the sign on the door to "Closed". She drew the curtains in the window closed and then turned back to her store.

Novels that had been left in the wrong spot on their shelves pulled out and switched places. Storybooks that had been abandoned after the customer decided not to buy them flew across the store to their rightful place. Covers opened and pages with bent corners smoothed out. Torn pages mended themselves. The papers at the front desk sorted themselves out as Marianne approached. With a tilt of her head, the books in her stack flew back to the shelves and fit snugly into their spot.

Marianne smiled as she watched the magic around her. This might have been the best part of her day, when she locked up the store and could use her abilities without worrying about anyone walking in on her.

She didn't know where her powers came from; all she knew was that they had started when she had been ten years old. Waking up with half of the objects in her room floating against the ceiling had certainly been an experience she wouldn't forget for the rest of her life. They certainly made her everyday life easier. Even when she couldn't use them in public the same way she used them at home, she could use them in other ways. Marianne was fairly certain half the people in the city thought she had superhuman strength, given the number of times she had walked through the streets carrying huge boxes of heavy books without breaking a sweat.

Marianne went to the back of the store, humming a song as she went. An old woman had come to the store the other day, with a huge cardboard box full of old books. The woman had told her that her husband had passed away recently and had left behind dozens of books the old woman couldn't keep. Marianne, feeling a painful sting in her heart as the old woman told her story, had accepted the donation. Who was she to question the widow's request? Personally, she thought the woman should have kept the books - even if she hadn't read them all, it surely would have been nice to have something to remember her husband by - but she knew perfectly well that everybody dealt with grief differently.

In any case, Marianne hadn't been able to put the books on the shelves yet. She had to go through them first, figure out what each one was about, find out where each of them would to, make sure none of them were too damaged to put on the shelves... But she had finished sorting through them the day before. The only reason she hadn't put them on the shelves already was that she had been too caught up in her latest read to do so.

That, and also because it was easier to put them on the shelves using her powers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Charles and Erik will make their debut in the next chapter. This chapter was mainly to give you a sense of Marianne's character.
> 
> Theresa is sort of an alternate version of a character from the comics, who's actually Sean's daughter. She's called Siryn. 
> 
> Hope you liked this chapter! Don't be shy, leave a kudos and/or a comment, please.


	3. Overture

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which two strangers appear in Marianne's store, act very sketchy, but manage to redeem themselves.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TW: Perceived threats of sexual assault/non-con (it's a misunderstanding and cleared up quickly).

An introduction to something more substantial.

* * *

Marianne had almost finished putting the books away when she heard the front door open. 

Her entire body went ice cold. She made a quick gesture, and the wooden ladder that was - luckily - in the same aisle as her flew across the floor to her. She dropped onto the top of the ladder, and the rest of the books floating around her crammed into whichever empty spots were closest to them. She winced slightly as she shoved the books into already too tight spaces. She'd fix them later.

"Anyone home?" A male voice called out. Just as soon as it had, a man walked into the aisle she was in. He brightened up when he saw her. "Oh, good!" 

Marianne sighed. He couldn't have seen anything. It definitely would not have been good for a stranger to see several books levitating several feet off the floor. It would have been worse for a stranger to see Marianne herself floating several feet off the floor, one leg over the other as though she were sitting on air. 

"I'm sorry, sir, but the store is closed right now," Marianne said, beginning to climb down the ladder. 

"Would you like some help getting down?" The man asked, already moving forward to assist her. Marianne held out a hand, stopping him from coming any closer. Instead, he hovered rather anxiously behind her, looking concerned. But Marianne finished climbing down by herself, and then she turned to examine at the man before her.

He was short, about the same height she would be if she hadn't been wearing heels. As it was, he was an inch shorter. He had a feminine appearance, to be quite frank; his thick, wavy brown hair and crystal blue eyes were not helping. Marianne had to admit (reluctantly), he was rather pretty. He was dressed in unwrinkled slacks and a dark blue sweater, underneath a grey tweed coat, giving him the appearance of a very young professor - he couldn't have been any older than her own thirty-one years.

"I'm sorry, sir," she said, not feeling sorry at all, "but as I said, the store is closed. I could have sworn I locked the door - I must have forgotten." Marianne knew for a fact she had locked the front door. 

The man didn't seem very bothered by this. "Is that a French accent I hear?" He asked, sounding amused. He himself had an obviously British accent. "I have to say, I didn't expect to find a French woman here, of all places." 

Marianne frowned at him. "I never expected to see a Brit in my shop. We don't get many limeys around here." 

To her surprise, he laughed, not offended in the slightest. "I suppose you wouldn't!" He stuck his hand out to her. "Charles Xavier, lovely to meet you. It  _ really  _ is," he added, looking her up and down. His eyes seemed to be most drawn to her legs, visible from the knee down.

Marianne didn't take his hand. She stuck her hands into the pockets of her skirt  _ (where is it, where is it - ah, found it) _ and glared into his eyes, once they came back up to meet hers. "Sir, as I've already said-" 

"Charles, there you are." Another chill ran up Marianne's spine as another man came around the corner and joined them, standing next to Charles. This man was tall - he stood, at most, a foot over both her and Charles - and was as masculine as Charles was feminine. He had lines and angles where Charles had curves - short, straight dark hair, piercing blue eyes, and a black turtleneck sweater (barely hiding a muscular build underneath) under a brown leather jacket all added to his... _ intense _ appearance. Marianne wouldn't have been surprised to learn he had once killed a man - or several. 

"Ah, Erik." Charles smiled at his partner. "I was wondering where you had wandered off to." 

"I'm sure you were," Erik said with a smirk. He was scrutinizing Marianne with cold eyes, and Marianne gripped the object hidden in her pockets even tighter. Charles, perhaps, but Erik, less likely. "Is this who we're looking for?" 

"Why, yes, I believe it is," Charles said with a smile as he turned back to her. She didn't like how either of them were looking at her. "We're alone in here, aren't we, love? We don't want any interruptions."

Marianne felt a third chill go up her spine at his words and she drew herself up to her full heigh. She was suddenly all too aware of the small confinements between the two shelves and the lack of space between herself and the two men.  _ I knew it.  _ Her mind began to play different scenes, all of the things they could have been planning, each scenario worse than the next. With her powers she could fight them off, but if they somehow managed to take her down before she could-

Charles's smile dropped immediately, as though he knew what she was thinking. "Oh, ma'am, I'm sorry, we're not here to-" he began as he took a step towards her. She glared at him, taking only a minute step back. The ladder behind Marianne began to tremble, but only she noticed. 

"Charles, unless you want to end up with a knife in your gut, I'd suggest taking a step back," Erik informed him.

Charles froze, then turned to Erik with wide eyes. Erik looked amused - perhaps because Marianne's expression matched Charles's. 

"You-" Charles's head swivelled around, back to Marianne, with the same shocked face. He did as Erik had told him, after a moment.

"How did you know that?" Marianne demanded. 

Erik smirked at her. "It's a gift of mine." 

Marianne eyed him for a moment, before pulling her switchblade out of her pocket. She held it up for them both to see, pressing the button and flipping out the blade. "A handy gift, though not for me." She examined her knife, running her finger along the edge. She wondered how Erik had known. She gave no signs that she carried a knife. Had he expected her to have a weapon? An odd thing to expect of a woman you had just met. Perhaps if he had known her for longer, he may have been able to guess she carried a knife wherever she went, but he had known immediately.  _ How had he known? _

"Perhaps not for you," Erik agreed, as though they were speaking about something as simple as the weather. "But definitely for my friend." 

Marianne shrugged. In all likelihood, stabbing the men would have been a last resort, only after using her powers to throw her bookshelf on top of them. No need to kill anyone so quickly - it was enough that no one would believe them if they said she had thrown a bookshelf at them. Still, it was good to have a physical weapon on hand at all times.

"Why do you have that?" Charles demanded, eyes flicking from Marianne to the knife in her hand. 

Marianne raised an eyebrow. "As a precaution."  _ In case two strange men come into my store after I know I've locked the door, refuse to leave when I've told them the store is closed, make eyes at me, and then ask me if I'm alone, _ she thought. 

Charles opened his mouth, but then closed it. Looking sheepish, he brought his pointer and his middle fingers up to his temple. Marianne frowned at him.  _ What is he doing? _

Then his voice was echoing through her mind.  _ 'You are absolutely right. This isn't going the way I had planned it to, I'm terribly sorry, Ms. Ouellet.' _

Marianne almost screamed. 

Instead, her hand flew to her mouth. "How did you do that?" She whispered, lowering her hand a bit so her voice would not be muffled. 

"So  _ now _ you decide to say something," Erik said, shaking his head, "but when she was obviously frightened by us-" 

"How was I to know?" Charles asked, rather defensively. "Her thoughts are a mix of French and English and I don't speak French-"

"You could have paid attention to how she was glaring at us-" 

"I asked you a question," Marianne interrupted, eyes narrowing when they didn't answer her. "How did you do that?" Her mind was racing; she had heard Charles's voice in her mind. She hadn't imagined it - it had been too clear, too real for her to have imagined it. He had spoken to her, in her head. And he said her thoughts were a 'mix' of French and English, which was definitely true, and he couldn't have known that unless- and Erik had known about the knife in her pocket and had said it was a gift of his but that might mean-

"You're like me," Marianne answered her own question. The brazenness of her statement alarmed her; what if she was wrong? What if they were normal people and she was imagining things and she had just outed herself?  _ What if they-  _

"I assure you, Ms. Ouellet, we are not here to harm you," Charles said. He still had his fingers to his temple, and was looking concerned. "I must apologize for the way we acted when we came in-"

" _ We _ ?" 

"You scared her too, Erik. You scare everyone. Either way, I am very sorry if we frightened you." He chuckled, a little nervously. "I appreciate you not stabbing me in self-defence." 

Marianne stared at Charles. She looked at Erik. Then she turned back to Charles. Finally, she opened her mouth. "So, if you are not here to-" she waved her hand vaguely, symbolizing whatever crime she had imagined, "then why have you broken into my shop after it closed for the day? I  _ know _ I locked my door," she added, with a pointed look at Charles. 

"We didn't break in, that would imply a forceful entry," Erik corrected. "I unlocked the door and we came in peacefully." 

"Regardless," Marianne said, annoyance rising in the place of whatever fear was left, "of how you came into my store, you came in after it was closed and refused to leave, and you still have not confirmed my statement. You are like me, yes or no?" 

"How else could I have unlocked a locked door?" Erik asked, a sly smile on his face. He raised his hand, twisting it slightly; the blade of Marianne's knife flicked back into place. She had not done that. 

Then, without warning, the knife was pulled from her hand. As she watched, transfixed, Erik waved his hand and the knife floated up, twirling around in the air, before coming back down into her open palm.

She had not done that, either.

Marianne looked down at her knife. She could hardly dare to believe it. There were others like her. She was not alone in her strangeness, her uniqueness. 

She had never been alone as a child. She had four younger sisters and a brother only a year younger than her. She had had friends, a family; she had never been alone. But even so, being the only one out of everyone she had ever known to be able to do the things she could do had been something no amount of friends or siblings could heal. She loved, yes, and she was loved. But there had never been anyone like her, and she had always felt a sense of loneliness because of it.

But these men were proof she wasn't alone. 

"You were never alone." Charles's voice was kinder than she had expected it to be. 

She took a deep breath, then let it out in the form of a sigh.  _ I was never alone, _ She thought.

Marianne looked up to face the two men with a calm stare. "So, your powers are," she gestured from Erik to herself, "like mine?" 

"Not quite," Charles said, looking relieved that this encounter had turned around for the better. "Erik's powers are similar to yours, but he manipulates magnetic fields. You have telekinesis - that is, you can control everything." 

Marianne gave him a look. She did not need to be told what she could do. "And you, you can read minds, I suppose?" 

Charles nodded. "Yes. Telepathy, you see. I can read minds, speak to people through their mind, all sorts of things." He tapped his finger to his head. "Very useful." 

"Although apparently, your limitations lie in whether or not you can understand the language the person thinks in." Erik chuckled at her comment. 

"Yes, admittedly, that is a flaw in my abilities," Charles admitted, though she could hear a trace of reluctance in his voice. Reluctant to admit his own flaws, was he? "Well, yes, I suppose I am."

Marianne twitched slightly. It was strange, knowing someone was capable of reading her mind. 

Charles nodded. "It is a strange thing to think about, and most people would be uncomfortable with it - which is why I make a point to not do so without good reason. Now, enough about me, we are here to talk about you, my dear. That is," he added, "if you don't want us to leave." He looked as though he would be very disappointed if she did, actually, want them to leave.

"Which would be understandable, considering," Erik said, with a pointed look at the back of Charles's head. 

Marianne crossed her arms, and considered. Looking at the two of them now, with the knowledge she had (however minimal it was), there wasn't the threat of two strange men against her alone. Charles had seemed genuinely distressed to learn what she had thought they were here for; Erik didn't sound like he would be offended if she did ask them to leave, like he understood the panic she had been feeling. For whatever strange reason, despite the distrust she had held for both of them only minutes before, she now felt as though she could trust them enough to know they wouldn't hurt her. 

And they were like her. She had never met anyone like her. She may never again get the chance to be with others like her if she turned them away now. 

Finally, Marianne nodded. "You may stay." 

Charles beamed at her. She could help but return it with a smile of her own, an honest smile she only gave to a select few. It didn't go unnoticed, under her eyes, how Charles's smile slackened and a light shade of pink rose to his cheeks when she did so. She didn't need to be a mind reader to know what he was thinking - it was not the first time her smile had dazzled a man, and it certainly wouldn't be the last. Charles averted his eyes from hers, for the first time since he had come in. Had he read her mind? Good. She wanted him to know she knew. 

She looked to Erik, who looked unfazed. "This shouldn't be spoken of in a public place. Especially if you unlocked the front door," she added. "Come on. I live above the store." 

She turned to lead them to the back room, where the stairs to her apartment above were located, when Erik said, "Charles may know your name, but I'm afraid I don't."

Marianne stopped, and turned around again. She stuck out her hand. "Marianne Ouellet." 

Erik reached and took her hand into his own strong, larger one. "Erik Lehnsherr."

* * *

"Would you like some tea?" Marianne asked them as they stepped into her living room. Her apartment was small, not as large as her bookstore downstairs was, but Marianne had done her best to make the small space as cozy and home-ey as possible. And, if you asked her, she had succeeded. "I usually make some for myself after work anyway, so it's no trouble." 

When she turned to look at them, Erik gave a brief nod. Charles smiled at her. "That would be wonderful, love." 

Marianne wondered if it was a British thing, or just a personal habit to call her 'love'. 

"A little bit of both." 

Marianne halted mid-step, then turned and gave Charles a look. He didn't notice - he was looking around her apartment. Trying to avoid her eye, or curious to see how she lived? With a shrug of her shoulders, she pointed to her couch in the corner of the room. They couldn't have missed it, it was the first thing you saw when you came through the front door. "Please, take a seat." 

As Erik and Charles sat down, Marianne stood over the small bookshelf next to the couch. On top of the shelf were several photos in picture frames, from throughout the years. She pressed her pointer and middle fingers to her lips and then pressed them to the picture at the front of the group. "Hello,  _ mon amour. _ " The sight of Lawrence's smile warmed her heart, as it always did after a long day at work. His eyes, despite the lack of colour in the photo, still had the spark they had held in real life, and it always made her feel better.

"Your husband?" Charles asked; she looked over to him, smiled, and nodded. No doubt he already knew; he had read her mind, he could see into her memories, he knew everything about her and they had only met ten minutes ago.

"You're married?" Erik asked, sounding surprised. 

Marianne's smile tightened slightly. "I was." She turned back to the photo, absentmindedly running her fingers over the edges of the frame. She didn't see it, but Erik's eyes softened as he watched her.

Clearing her throat, Marianne removed her gaze from the photo and turned to face the two men. "I mean, I suppose it makes sense." On the other side of the room, in her kitchen, a cabinet door opened and a kettle drifted into the sink. "There are thousands of people in this world, I knew I could not be the only one with my abilities, but it is completely different to meet others for yourself." 

"Yes, I understand completely," Charles agreed, although he seemed a little distracted now as he watched the kettle, now filled with water, float onto the kitchen stove. His entire face seemed to light up with utter delight when the sink's faucet turned off and the stovetop turned on without being touched. 

"I never knew there could be others like myself," Erik said. "Not until I met Charles." He, like Charles, watched Marianne's display of her powers with fascination, but he was not nearly as open with his excitement. He was smiling - that seemed to be the extent of it.

Marianne couldn't help but smile as well. She turned to the small square table in between her kitchen and living room (which had no wall or divider between them) and picked up one of the two chairs. She set it back down right in front of the couch, sat down, crossed one knee over the other and leaned forward. "Now, tell me, what is this all about?" 

What came next was an explanation long enough to allow time for the water to finish boiling. In between sips of tea, once it was finished and Marianne summoned the cups over (Erik had to take over the explanation at that point, as Charles had gotten distracted again by the kettle pouring tea into three separate cups on the other side of the room) (he had started talking about how  _ amazing _ her telekinesis was and how it looked like she had brought the objects to life and they were doing everything on their own instead of being controlled by her from afar and- Erik had cut him off at this point), the two of them had explained everything she needed to hear.

"So." Marianne placed her empty cup in the air. Never mind the table, she thought, regardless of the fact that the table was within arms reach and she could have put her cup down on it instead. "If I understand completely - and stop me if I am wrong - there is a small group of other mutants, being led by a man called Sebastian Shaw. And you believe he and his team are doing something," she vaguely waved her hand in the air, "that you believe to be endangering humanity or the world itself." 

"We don't believe so, we know so," Erik corrected, his voice tight. His shoulders were tense and his fists clenched tight, and they had been since Sebastian Shaw had come into the conversation. Marianne suspected, with a hint of concern, Erik and Shaw had some sort of history, beyond what they were telling her now.

"We - and a friend of ours, Moira MacTaggert - believe he is responsible for the recent placing of nuclear missiles in Turkey," Charles explained. 

Marianne nodded in understanding. "And what you and the CIA are doing is gathering up other mutants to create a team, training them, and hoping you can all take down Shaw, saving the world." 

"That's the plan, yes." 

"Although we haven't begun training yet," Erik said. "And we don't have a large group of them yet. Right now we have about," he tilted his head in thought, "seven other mutants, including Charles and myself." 

"We're planning on finding more, of course," Charles continued. "There's another mutant in this very city, other than yourself, who we're planning on talking to next. And there's even more, out there, waiting for us. And you're one of them."

Marianne nodded. "And so, you've come to try and... Recruit me to help save the world?"

"Yes." Erik leaned forward, looking right into her eyes. "Ms. Ouellet, your powers are phenomenal. You could tip the scale in our favour in the fight against Shaw." 

"You are making a large assumption, based solely on what you have seen before you." Marianne inclined her head towards the kitchen. "You've seen very little of what I can do." 

"I've seen into your mind," Charles reminded her, leaning forward as well. "I know you can do far more than you believe, with the right training."

"Is that so?" 

"Yes," Charles said firmly. "If you would only let us help you, we could unlock your potential."

"What if I have already unlocked my own potential?" Marianne asked with a raised eyebrow.

Charles gave a chuckle. "All the better for us, then." 

He didn't think she had reached her full potential, did he? He was humouring her. Perhaps she hadn't in  _ his  _ eyes, but what she could do was enough for her life. 

"So, what do you say, love?" Charles asked, leaning back in his seat. He looked so unbelievably cocky.

"No." 

Marianne said it in the flattest tone imaginable, and there were no words to describe the delight she felt when the smile dropped from Charles's face. 

She stood up, picked up her teacup from where it was still hanging in the air, took Erik's empty cup when he offered it to her, and walked to the kitchen, Charles' cup bobbing in the air as it followed her.  

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so Charles and Erik have joined the story, and they did not get off to the best start with Marianne. This was something I thought of when I was reading some other First Class stories, where Erik and Charles come off as sort of sketchy. And also there's the fact that they definitely could come off as a little creepy to the mutants they're recruiting if they come at a bad time. 
> 
> Also, if you think Charles came off as arrogant, that's good, because that's what I was trying to do. In this movie, Charles definitely had an arrogant asshole vibe to him. I still love him, though.
> 
> Hope you liked this chapter! Don't be shy, leave a kudos and/or a comment, please.


	4. Reason

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Erik and Charles find out the reason for Marianne's rejection and choices are made.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> French Translations:  
> Mon loup - My wolf  
> Est-ce à propos de vos pouvoirs? Sont-ils- - Is it about your powers? Are they-  
> Les devoirs - Homework
> 
> Anything underlined and in italics is French as well, even if it's written in English.

A good or obvious cause to do something.

* * *

"Ms. Ouellet, I'm afraid - I don't think you understand-"

"No." Marianne turned back to the men in her living room with a calm smile. "I do. And I'm saying no."

"We understand that," said Erik, looking and sounding less confused than his partner. Perhaps he just hid it well. "But we need you to understand; you are powerful. You would be -"

"What tips the scales in your favour, yes, I understand. _You_ don't seem to understand that I am saying no."

Charles stood and approached her kitchen counter. "Shaw is _dangerous_ ," he stressed. "Going up against his team will be _dangerous_ and we need _all_ the help we can get. I just-" he had to take a deep breath before he continued. "I don't understand why you are saying no when we are giving you the chance to not only meet other people like yourself but also realize your full potential."

"You say you don't understand," Marianne said, "after explaining exactly why I am saying no. This Shaw man is dangerous, and he has his underlings who, as you have said, are equally dangerous. To join you would be risking my life." She placed her hands on the counter and leaned forward. "I'm sorry, I truly am, but I cannot put my life on the line for this."

"I understand your concerns-" Charles began, but he was quickly interrupted.

"Do you?" She questioned, a challenge in her tone. He couldn't look her in the eyes and say that, not when he had to know why she couldn't do this. She looked at him - took in how he stood and how he dressed and even the look in his eyes, and she knew. He would never understand, even if he looked through every memory she had from the past twelve years.

Charles could read her mind, but he didn't know how she felt.

"How is your fear for your life more difficult to understand than anyone else's?" Erik challenged, getting to his feet. "Everyone we've recruited understands the danger, and are willing to risk their lives to defeat Shaw. What makes you think your life is more precious than any of theirs?"

She looked at the two men. Charles, though he did a fantastic job of hiding it, was looking at her with judgement in his eyes. He seemed close to glaring at her. Erik, on the other hand, made no attempt at hiding his annoyance with her. A muscle in his jaw clenched and his eyes were hard. If she had been a lesser woman, with no experience with a threatening man glaring at her, she would have been shaking. They thought she was selfish, these two men. They had found people unafraid of risking their lives, and they themselves were unafraid of risking their lives in this... _whatever_ this mission was. She wasn't, and they thought her selfish for it.

Perhaps she was, but even so, she wasn't ashamed of it. Not when she had every reason to be selfish. Before Marianne could respond, tell Erik that no, she didn't think she was more important than anyone else, and why exactly she was saying 'no' to him and Charles, her attention to the conversation was diverted as she heard footsteps coming up the stairs. The front door opened and then slammed shut.

"Hey, mom, sorry I'm late, I was-"

Henry stopped, mid-sentence, as he walked into the living room and realized Marianne was not alone. Erik and Charles, both of whom had turned to look at the door when they heard it open, stared right back at him. After a moment, they turned to each other - Charles with dawning understanding, while Erik looked a little miffed.

"Hello, _mon loup_ ," greeted Marianne, smiling at her son. "How was your day?"

Henry didn't answer. He walked into the kitchen, staring suspiciously at Erik and Charles the entire time. When he reached his mother's side, he glanced at her for a second to give her a smile, before going back to glaring at the two men. "Who are they?" He demanded.

Marianne wrapped one arm around Henry's shoulders, cupping his cheek with her other hand as she kissed his forehead. "They're safe, sweetling. Don't worry." When she looked back at them, they were still staring at her. Something about the way Charles looked at her had changed, while all of the tension lining Erik's shoulders seemed to have left him.

"But who are they?" Henry repeated, though his glare had softened. Marianne couldn't repress a smile. Her boy had always been so protective of her, even though he knew she could handle herself just fine.

Charles shook his head, coming back to himself. He took a step forward and stretched out his hand over the counter. "Charles Xavier, it's a pleasure to meet you, Henry."

Henry hesitantly reached out and took Charles's hand, giving it a shake. When he looked at Erik, the German seemed to snap out of a daze. He had been staring at Henry with an odd expression, a melancholy look in his eyes. Coming back to himself, he offered his own hand for Henry to shake, introducing himself as well. To Marianne's surprise, Erik then proceeded to give Henry a smile. Not a smirk, but a soft, gentle smile, but the melancholy in his eyes hadn't left, and Marianne couldn't _not_ notice it. Charles had noticed something was off about his friend as well and turned to look at him, concern in his eyes.

"What do you want with my mom?" Henry asked, edging more towards open hostility with every second someone didn't tell him what he wanted to know.

Charles opened his mouth to respond, but Marianne swiftly cut him off before he could speak. " _Mon loup , _I will tell you later." She looked up at them with piercing dark blue eyes. "They were going to be leaving soon, anyway. Do you have homework?" When Henry reluctantly nodded, Marianne ruffled his hair once more before lightly pushing him in the direction of his room, which was right through a door off the kitchen.

Henry looked up at her, then looked at Erik and Charles. After a moment, he decided to trust his mother, though he still looked suspiciously at them as he closed the door to his bedroom.

After a moment of silence, Charles's voice echoed in her mind. _Does he know about you?_

"About my powers?" Marianne asked, guessing what he had meant. When he nodded, she did as well. "He's my son, it would hardly make sense for him not to know about them."

Henry's bedroom door cracked open, and a shaggy brunette head popped out. _"Est-ce à propos de vos pouvoirs? Sont-ils-?"_

_"Les devoirs_."

"But-"

" _Now._ "

Henry disappeared back into his room.

Erik chuckled, and when Marianne gave him a quizzical look, he turned a smile in her direction. "How old is he?" He asked.

"He's twelve," she answered, after a moment. "Do you have kids, yourself?" The way he had gone from cold to warm when Henry had come into the room suggested he had some experience with children.

Erik shook his head firmly. "No, never had the time."

"You have a _son._ " Charles said it with the air of someone who had finally made sense of the world.

Marianne looked at him. "You did not see it before?" _Just how useful is telepathy if he could not see something as obvious as that?_

"Must have skipped over that part." He shook his head as if to clear it. "Although this does explain a lot."

"Does it?" She lifted her chin. "Do you understand now? I could die on this mission. I cannot leave my son, my _only son_ , an orphan. I'm all he has."

"We understand," Erik said. "Believe me, we understand."

Marianne looked him in the eye - the melancholy was still there, and she knew he really did understand. She glanced at Charles. The same understanding was not present in his eyes - though he did seem to understand - and she wondered what his mother was like.

Charles averted his eyes. She wondered if he had heard her. "Well, Ms. Ouellet, since you are clearly not going to change your mind anytime soon..." He looked at Erik. When Erik looked at him, Charles gestured his head in the direction of the door. "Sorry to have bothered you, and thank you for the tea," he added as he and Erik began their exit. "As an Englishman, I've found most Americans cannot, for the life of them, make a decent cup of tea."

"Let me escort you out," she offered. She followed them to the door, slipping past them and opening it for them. No need for the neighbours to see two strange men leaving her store without her leading them out (especially since one of them looked like he could have been a member of the Mafia). If the wrong person were to see, there would be either a panic (which would likely end with the police checking to see if she or Henry were dead) or the spreading of rumours (which would likely paint her as some sort of harlot). And, besides that, her mother had raised her to have _manners_.

"Truly," she said as she led them out of the backroom, "I'm sorry for all of this. I would join you if I could, but I can't."

"Don't worry about it," Charles said, waving off her apology. He looked at her desk as they passed it, craning his neck to see what she had been reading most recently. "We understand, and while I must say it is disappointing to have to go without your talents-"

"We'll live," Erik interrupted, shooting Charles a look.

Marianne smiled. They had been surprisingly understanding, once they had learned the reason for her unwillingness to fight. "Thank you, for understanding."

They had stepped out the front door, and Marianne was leaning on the doorframe when Charles suddenly turned around. "You know, the CIA would be willing to pay you for your services."

She frowned at him. She thought he had given up.

Charles gave Erik - who had raised an eyebrow - a side-glance, before taking a step towards Marianne. "I know you have a lot of financial problems at the moment-"

Her eyes widened for a fraction of a second, right before they narrowed into slits. _How dare he-_

"-And I want to help you," Charles finished. "The CIA can and will pay you as much as you need, they can pay you for helping us. You just need to help _us_." He looked at her, staring into her eyes and not looking away, despite the anger she was directing at him.

Marianne glared at him, fire blazing in her chest. How dare he waltz into her life and - and after she had _refused_ him, he thought giving her a paycheck would make her say yes?

He was looking at her so earnestly, though - maybe he really did want to help. After a moment, the burning sensation faded, and her gaze softened. She chewed her lip, looking back into the store. She thought of the bills on her desk, hidden in a drawer to ensure Henry wouldn't see them and worry.

Charles held out a small, rectangular card. "This has the address and the phone number of the hotel Erik and I are staying at. If you change your mind, just give us a call. We're leaving tomorrow."

She stared at the offered paper for a moment, weighing her options. She reached out and took it. As she did, he put his hand over her own and held it, and when she looked into his eyes, he looked into hers. She searched his eyes, trying to find any hint of ulterior motives. She found nothing.

He could just be a good actor.

"If I really wanted to convince you to join us," he said, and she wondered if he had read her mind or if she was just easy to read. "I could do so with far less morally correct methods." He drew his hand back and tapped his fingers against his head. "We really can help you. But the choice is yours."

She watched the men walk down the sidewalk until they turned a corner and disappeared. She stood there for a minute, maybe longer, wondering, _what if..._

Then she stepped back and shut the door.

* * *

Even as she made dinner, she was distracted.

Not distracted enough that any of the knives floating around her posed a threat - no, she had learned a long time ago to not get too distracted when she was using her powers. Bad things could happen if she lost focus. Her mind could wander, but if she completely slipped away and didn't pay attention, she made mistakes.

Luckily, she had learned how to focus on multiple things at once since having Henry. 

Henry, who sat at the dinner table now that the men were gone, seemed to have noticed her distracted state of mind. He kept glancing up at her from his algebra homework. He kept to himself, but she knew he would question her at dinner.

Marianne had said she wasn't going to do it, and so she wasn't going to do it. She couldn't risk it. As she had said, she was all Henry had, and she couldn't risk her life. She couldn't leave her son an orphan. No matter how much they were willing to pay her for her help. That should have been the end of it.

But it wasn't, because her mind kept going back to the offer. _As much as she needed._ All she really needed was enough to pay the bills for this month, maybe the next month, and that would be enough. Her bookstore was popular in the city, there were always people coming in, but she often came up just short of what Henry and she both needed. There was always more to be done, new things to get, Henry was growing so quickly, and with her being the only one providing for the family, there was never enough.

It wasn't like it was guaranteed she would die. Shaw and his henchmen might have been dangerous, but she was strong enough. Her powers were strong enough.

But there was still the chance, and it was too big of a chance to take.

But they needed the money.

And on and on her thoughts spun in circles, each possible reason for joining them quickly followed for a reason not to join them, and vice versa.

Several times she found herself looking at the picture of Lawrence, staring at her from his place on the bookshelf. _If he were here,_ she thought, _he could help._ Lawrence had always known what to say to calm her or to help her make almost impossible decisions. But he was not here, not anymore, and she was the only one who could make the decision.

It wasn't until after five minutes of eating in silence that Henry finally asked her, "So, what did they want?"

Marianne chewed her piece of carrot. _What to say...?_

"Was it something about your powers? Were they from the government or something?"

She swallowed. "Yes, to both." It was better to tell him the truth. Perhaps saying it out loud would clear her mind. "They were both like me."

"They had powers too?" Henry leaned forward, staring at her with huge eyes. "I didn't know there were other people like you!"

"Neither did I," said Marianne, smiling slightly. "What a shock it was to find out, too."

"What could they do?"

"The short one, Charles, he can read minds." _And apparently could do other things, too,_ she thought, remembering what he had said before they had parted ways. "The tall one-"

"Erik?" Henry asked.

"Yes, he can control magnetic force." She took another bite of her meal. "His powers are a bit like mine, but only with metal."

"He was cool."

"You barely talked to him."

"Yeah, but he looked cool," he said, in a matter of fact, 'I can't believe you _didn't_ notice it' tone. "Like he was in the mafia. Do you think he's ever killed a person?"

Marianne laughed. "I thought the same thing when I first saw him!"

"He looks like he has!" Henry exclaimed, grinning. "So, what did they want?"

Marianne sobered quickly. "They wanted me," she said, fiddling with the locket around her neck, a nervous habit of hers, "to join them and some other people like me, on a mission, to take down a man, also like me. They told me he was dangerous, and that he needed to be taken down, and he's so dangerous only people like us can do so."

Henry nodded, absorbing in this information. "What did you say?"

"I told them I couldn't do it."

"Oh." He took a bite of his mashed potatoes, chewed and swallowed, before he asked, "Why not?"

Marianne shrugged. "I have too much to do here. I have you." She leaned forward. "I told them I couldn't leave you." That could have been the end of it, but then Henry said:

"Then why do you look like you've changed your mind?"

She blinked; Henry stared at her. "You were distracted all before dinner. You wouldn't be so distracted if you hadn't changed your mind." He leaned forward, no accusing look in his eye - just open and honest curiosity. "Did you change your mind?"

What could she say to that? She didn't know. She hadn't changed her mind - but she was _thinking_ about changing her mind, and she didn't know what to say. Marianne worried her lip a bit. "Charles said something that may have made me... _reconsider_ my choice." She looked at Lawrence's picture. _Give me strength._ "He offered - well, he said the CIA would offer me any amount of money I needed in exchange for helping them." She set down her fork and put her fingertips together, pressing them to her lips as she put her elbows on the table. "And I know I never talk about it with you, Henry, but we do need more money."

"I know." Henry looked down at his plate. "I've seen you staring at the bills, sometimes. I know you're worried. I've been thinking about maybe getting a job, like a paper route or something, to help out." It wasn't fair his mom was the only mom he knew who had to worry about paying for them both to live all by herself. All of his friends had both parents to help pay the bills, and even if only their dads worked, at least their moms were around, so the option of a second paycheck was there. His mom was the only mom he knew who had to do everything alone, and it was not fair.

Marianne resisted the urge to pinch the bridge of her nose. _Another reason to accept the offer._ Her son should not have to be worrying about their financial struggles. His biggest worry should have been whether or not he would have homework to do over the weekend. "Thank you, _mon loup. _ If I decided to accept their offer, we would have more money, but I would be gone for an -" she paused. _What was the word- ah, yes_ . "An _indeterminate_ length of time." She glanced up at Henry. He nodded, letting her know she had gotten the word right.

"And," she continued. "It would be a risk. I don't know if I would be coming back at all. If something were to happen-"

"Is this guy really that dangerous?" Henry interrupted.

"Erik and Charles believe so."

"How dangerous?"

"Dangerous enough they think he put missiles in Turkey."

Marianne looked up in alarm as Henry's fork clattered to his plate. He stared at her with huge blue eyes, panicked. "There are missiles in Turkey?" He whispered.

"I-"

"Thomas said that his father said there might be a war - is that true?" Henry demanded, leaning forward, eyes searching hers desperately for some sign that it wasn't true. "Mrs. Carter said we've been at war with the Russians since the second war, is that what this is? And Angela said her mother said-"

"There's not going to be a war," Marianne interrupted, speaking firmly so to get Henry to listen to her. "America and the Soviets are too scared of destroying the world to start a war, and if they haven't blown each other up in more than a decade, they're not going to start now." She stood and picked up her plate, hoping that was the end of that conversation. She brought it to the kitchen and dropped it into the sink. When she looked back to Henry, he was staring at his plate with the expression of someone who had just been faced with his own mortality.

She glided over to him and squeezed his shoulder comfortingly. "There's nothing to worry about," she said firmly. "I promise you, sweetling."

Henry nodded, not looking convinced. As he took his own plate to the sink, she heard him mutter, "Obviously there is, or they wouldn't need to stop him..."

Marianne could only sigh.

She looked at Lawrence again. The card with the hotel's information on it was right next to the photo.

* * *

"She's not going to call us, Charles," Erik told his friend. Charles had not stopped glancing at the telephone in their room since they had arrived at the hotel. "She's made her decision."

"Yes, she's made her decision, but she could still change her mind," Charles declared. "We certainly gave her enough of a reason to."

" _You_ gave her a reason to," Erik corrected, jabbing a finger in Charles's direction. "Don't drag me into this. I had nothing to do with it."

"Yes, _I_ gave her a reason to, but really, if you had only seen what I had seen..." Charles shuddered in elation at the memory. When he had tapped into her mind with Cerebro, he had seen everything she had to offer (though he had _obviously_ missed some of her key memories, he noted with annoyance). She was more powerful than she could possibly imagine. It was glorious, feeling the power she possessed, and she used it for nothing more than sorting out her store and taking care of everyday chores. "Believe me, my friend, we need her on our team."

Erik sighed and shook his head before he returned to his book. "She's a mother, Charles. She should stay with her son." He remembered the way the boy, _Henry_ had gone right to his mother, had glared at them both, obviously a boy used to protecting his mother. Ms. Ouellet only kissed her son's forehead and Erik's view of her had transformed; from a woman refusing to help them defeat evil to a woman with every reason to reject them.

"I agree. However-"

The phone rang. Charles took a second to grin victoriously at Erik before he ran to answer it. "Hello, love," he greeted.

 _"How much will I be paid?"_ Ms. Ouellet asked on the other end. Charles winked at Erik, who sighed again.

"As much as you need, I can make arrangements as soon as you have a number." Charles listened to her tell him the amount she wanted and quickly wrote it down on the pad of paper next to the phone. "Yes, yes, I can definitely arrange this."

 _"I would hope so, since you told me you could,"_ Ms. Ouellet remarked. _"Do you need to give me any more information, or will I have to find the CIA's building on my own?"_

"No, no need to worry about that, we'll come by your store tomorrow to pick you up - will sometime around nine in the morning work for you?"

He heard rustling on the other end. _"That works fine for me, thank you, I just need to make arrangements with a friend."_

"Yes, of course. Thank you so much for your help, Ms. Ouellet, we really appreciate it. You're doing your country a great service."

 _"First, Charles, call me Marianne,"_ she responded.

 _"Second,"_ she continued, _"I'm Canadian."_ And with that, she hung up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hope you liked this chapter! Don't be shy, leave a vote and/or a comment, please.


	5. Departure

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the adventure finally begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anything in italics and underlined is spoken in French.

The action of leaving, typically to start a journey.

* * *

The following morning found Marianne awake about an hour before she normally was. She wasn't sure how early it was, exactly, but the sun hadn't risen yet, and usually when she woke up, sunlight would be streaming in through her curtains. It was dark, and except for the sound of a dog barking in the distance, it was quiet. She lay there in the dark for a few minutes, absorbing the sounds and smells of her home. There was always the faint smell of books in her room, and she was never sure if it was just the natural smell of the room or if it was a scent she carried with her. Her bedsheets were soft and worn, and they were warm. She curled in on herself, pulling her knees closer to her chest. She breathed in. She breathed out. Her heart was pounding. She clenched her sheets tight in her fists and buried her face in them.

 _It's going to be fine,_ she reminded herself. _It will be fine._

It was going to be fine.

Figuring she would not be getting any more sleep, Marianne pulled herself out of bed. She examined herself in her mirror. Whatever she wore today, she would be wearing when she met the other mutants, to use the word Charles had used the previous day. She would already look beautiful, as she always did, regardless of what she wore, but it was important to dress to impress. As her bed made itself behind her, Marianne selected a deep blue knee-length skirt and a loose white blouse. It was one of her favourite outfits, and it looked only slightly more amazing on her than her other outfits, and it could be worn in either a casual or formal setting.

As she brushed her hair and applied her makeup at her vanity, clothes flew from her dresser and into the small suitcase she had open on her bed. She looked over her shoulder once to give her bookshelf an examination, before deciding to bring _Sense and Sensibility_ with her. It had been a while since she had read Jane Austen. She didn't know how much spare time she would have, but it was always better to be safe than sorry, and it was better to bring one book instead of an entirely separate bag for only books.

For this specific situation. For any other situation, bringing a separate bag exclusively for books was entirely acceptable, and she would stand by that rule for.

Only half finished with her preparations for the day, Marianne pulled the notebook on her vanity towards her, flipped it open to a random page, and made a list.

  * X. and L. will arrive at around 9 am
  * Henry wakes up at 7:30, goes to school at 8
  * it is 5 am and I am awake ~~do not want to be awake~~  cannot go back to sleep
  * 6 am should open shop but I can not open up because I will not be at home for who knows how long a week? Maybe more?
  * I can still back out of this
  * I cannot back out of this
  * after school Henry will come back home to get anything he needs, then will go to Fallon and Patrick Cassidy's ~~and he will be safe there~~
  * need to thank them again, should bake them something ~~if~~ when I return (?)
  * ??????????



Marianne found herself scribbling question marks over the page, for lack of anything else she could write. It was all so simple, really, and yet everything could go wrong so quickly. 

Even if nothing else would be, at least Henry would be safe. Marianne had been friends with Fallon and Patrick ever since their son had wandered into her store. While they were not extremely close, they were friends enough to know they could trust the other with their children. She could trust them with Henry.

It was a shame Sean would not be there with them. Henry and Sean had always been close. When Marianne had called Fallon the night before, Fallon had commented on what a coincidence it was that both Sean and she would be gone for the next little while. Sean's class would be going on a research trip for the next few weeks or so, apparently. Marianne had agreed, it was, indeed, a coincidence.

Marianne wondered, just for a moment, if Sean could possibly have been the other mutant Charles and Erik had mentioned being in the city. She quickly brushed it off. Surely they wouldn't have recruited someone as young as Sean for this.

Marianne wondered if she should make a list of Henry's allergies - then she remembered he didn't have any. She set to making a list of all of the information the Cassidy's would need to know about Henry, from his school hours to his preferred foods to the phone numbers of his friends' mothers, just in case they needed to get in touch with someone in case of an emergency, as well as the number and address for his school. When she finished that list, she tapped her pen against the paper, staring at it for a few minutes. There was nothing else that needed to be said, and her stomach turned over.

She needed to eat breakfast. She tore the list of Henry's information out of her notebook and brought it with her into the kitchen. Marianne set about making breakfast with her hands, rather than using her powers. She needed to focus on something other than her own thoughts or she might do something she regretted. She made crepes and ate them with maple sugar and syrup.

Some of the stereotypes of Canadians were accurate.

Henry woke up on his own at around six-thirty and surprised her by coming out of his room fully dressed and ready to face the day.

 _"_ _Mon loupe_ , what are you doing up so early?" She had asked him.

He had responded, "I wanted to spend some time with you before you left."

Marianne had kissed his forehead and both cheeks twice each and let him put more sugar and syrup on his crepes than might have been necessary. She was not going to stop him this time, even if watching him drown them in syrup and cover them with sugar made her cringe.

"You know all of the plans for today, yes?" She asked him when he had finished.

Henry nodded, wiping some sugar off the corners of his mouth with his sleeve. Marianne didn't comment. "I'm going to school like normal, and when it's over I come back here, get anything I need, lock up the apartment and the store, and then go to the Cassidy's. Easy peasy."

"Put this list in your backpack, and give it to them when you get there." Marianne passed him the list. Henry took it and set it on the table for later. He reached into his pocket and pulled out a piece of paper that had been folded into quarters, hiding the message from her.

"Give this to those guys, when they come pick you up, please," he requested. "And don't read it."

Marianne's eyebrow raised as she took the paper, but didn't comment. She set it on the table. She asked Henry what would happen at school. Henry brightened and began to tell her about what his teacher had told his class they would be doing. Their class would be going to the chemistry lab, to do an experiment of some sort. Henry would do the preparatory notes at recess before they had to do the experiment, so everything would be alright and he would be allowed to do everything.

"You didn't finish it?" Marianne asked him.

"I forgot about it," Henry admitted with a shrug. "But I can finish it, it's all okay. I finished my other homework. And the experiment is easy, everyone in the other class said so. I wish they would let us do more chemistry, but the teachers all say we have to wait until high school to do anything cool." He rolled his eyes.

"You could do the notes now." Marianne checked the clock on the wall. "You have plenty of time, and you won't have to rush."

" _Mom-_ " Henry caught the stern look Marianne gave him and nodded. "I'll do it now."

While Henry quietly finished the homework he had forgotten about, Marianne went around the apartment, cleaning things that she had already cleaned and fixing things she had already fixed.

"Mom," Henry said as Marianne washed a plate, "you already washed that plate. Twice."

Marianne looked down at the plate in her hands. She had, as Henry pointed out, washed it already, only fifteen minutes ago, and another time half an hour ago. "Yes, I see that, thank you, _mon loupe_ _."_

"Are you nervous?" Henry asked.

Marianne inhaled in a controlled way. She turned to face her son with a smile. "Not at all. No need to worry. Everything will be fine."

" _I_ know that," Henry said. "I'm not the one going off to fight some supervillain who might be trying to start a war."

"Finish your homework."

"I finished it."

"Then read your book."

"Are you nervous?"

Marianne sighed. She walked over to Henry and cupped his face with her hands, looking him in the eyes. "No," she said. "I'm going to be fine. It's going to be alright, I promise."

She wasn't sure who she was trying to convince. Maybe the both of them.

Henry stared up at her. He looked so much like his father. "Are you worried?" She asked him.

Henry looked at her hairline instead of her eyes. It was something he did when he wanted to avoid a subject or when he was about to lie. He didn't say anything, so she knew it was the former.

She leaned down and kissed his forehead. "It will be fine, you'll see. I'm going to come home." Her insides, which before had felt fluttery and nervous, settled. She was calm now for the first time today. Marianne could not pretend to be okay knowing Henry was not okay, and knowing he was not okay gave her the strength to actually _be okay._ "And I'm going to come home soon," she added, giving him a hug. "And we can tell Sean all about how I saved the world. How about that?"

Henry hugged her back. It was a tighter hug than he normally gave. "He won't believe us," he reminded her. "Since he doesn't know the truth."

"We can tell him I'm a super secret agent trained in the Canadian wilderness to save the world. How about that?"

He laughed as he pulled out from her arms. "What about your powers?" He asked. "Do you think they'll be strong enough?"

Marianne gave him another smile. "Do not worry about it. Go read your book. What are you reading?"

" _A Wrinkle In Time_. I'm almost done."

"Read it to me, Henry, will you?"

"Sure, mom."

* * *

" _You will stay safe."_

_"I'm just going to school. Will you stay safe?"_

Marianne stroked his hair.  _"I will stay safe. I promise. You be good. And stay safe."_

Henry looked offended.  " _I'm always good."_

_" That's a lie." _

_"I'm mostly good. I'm very good for other people."_

_"That is true. Most of the time,_ "  Marianne allowed. Henry adjusted the straps of his backpack. Marianne fixed the fringe of his hair. He half-heartedly tried to swat her hands away. Neither of them truly knew how to say goodbye.

"Give those guys that message," Henry requested. "Please."

Marianne patted her skirt pocket. "I'll remember, sweetling, don't worry. Remember to..."

"Thank the Cassidy's?"

"Yes, exactly. And do your homework. If Theresa asks you for help with something, you help her, alright?"

Henry rolled his eyes. "You only met her yesterday, mom, and _I've_ never met her."

"She's _darling_ ," Marianne insisted, "and she's Sean's little sister. And he's not going to be around for a while. She'll need someone."

Henry sighed. "Fine, I'll do it for Sean." He paused, frowning. "Do you think Sean has," he glanced around, but no one was in the shop except for the two of them, "powers? Like you?"

Marianne smiled. "I doubt it. Fallon said he was going on a school trip. And if he did have powers, don't you think he would have told me?" Sean was not what anyone would consider good at keeping secrets.

"That's true," Henry allowed. He glanced at the clock on Marianne's desk. "I have to go, or I'll be late."

"And we don't want that, do we?" Marianne put her hands on his cheeks and kissed his forehead. " _Au revoir, mon loupe."_

Henry smiled and lifted his hands to cover hers. " _Au revoir, maman._ " With a wave over his shoulder, Henry turned and walked out of the store.

Marianne took a moment to stare at the front door. It was possible that everything could go wrong and that would be the last time she ever saw him. She felt a painful squeeze in her chest at the thought.

But no, it would not be the last time she saw him, not if she had _(what was the phrase)_ any say in it.

She still had an hour before Erik and Charles were meant to arrive, and so she pulled a book off the top of a nearby stack and flipped it open. It was a book of poetry, one she had yet to put on the shelves because she had wanted to read it for herself. What a struggle it was to not try and read every book in her store! But she had long since come to peace with the fact that she would never be able to read everything, and so instead took comfort in the fact that what she could read, she had all the time in the world to read. She simply took it off the shelf and kept it to herself until she had finished. Lawrence had always teased her for her hoarding tendencies.

The book consisted of French poems. Books in her mother tongue did usually not sell as well as ones written in English (and the same could be said with any book not written in English), so if she ended up liking the book there would be little harm in her keeping it. Marianne flipped it open and began to read...

The jingling of the bell startled Marianne. She looked up to see Charles walking through the front door and towards her desk. "Sorry to startle you," he apologized. "Good book?"

Marianne glanced at the clock on her wall and then down at her book. An hour had passed and she was more than halfway through her book. She hadn't noticed the passing of time.

"Very good," she answered with a nod. She shut the book and slipped it into a pocket of her suitcase. It was better to bring it with her than to wait for who-knew-how-long to return to it. Now she had two books to read.

Marianne slipped off of her stool and gave Charles a smile. "How has your day been?"

Charles, looking a little surprised at her change in attitude from yesterday, answered, "It's been very pleasant, thank you for asking. And yours?"

Marianne merely shrugged as she began to close the open drawers on her desk. Charles nodded in understanding (perhaps reading her mind so he could understand). "You're very brave," he said, "for choosing to follow us. Really, I can't thank you enough for what you're doing."

Marianne walked around her desk, suitcase in hand, and put her hand on his shoulder as she passed by him. "It isn't bravery, not really. No thanks are necessary. I am just simply doing what I need to do."

"Did you get all of your things in order?" Charles asked as they made their way to the front door.

Marianne nodded. "I arranged for Henry to stay with some friends of mine, I've told him where the extra key to the shop will be if he needs to come home for any reason and he has lost his own key, I have everything I need, everything in the apartment is off... everything is in order." She picked up a "Closed" sign from a bench next to the front door and propped it up against the window, so anyone passing by would see it. "It is a shame, though," she continued. "One of my favourite customers is the son of the friends he will be staying with, but he won't be around. Apparently, he is going on a trip with his classmates from school."

"This customer is also a friend of yours?" Charles asked, smiling like he knew something she didn't.

Marianne couldn't help but smile. "I suppose you could call him a friend of mine, yes." It was hard to really consider Sean a friend; she had known him since he was a young boy and had watched him grow into a young man. He was dear to her, of course, she would never say otherwise, but to call him a friend didn't seem right. If anything, he was a second son to her.

"Oh, that is a shame," Charles agreed.

Marianne gave him a quizzical look. He was acting strangely. Shrugging it off, she picked her suitcase off the ground and pulled open her front door. The bell jingled, and she tried not to think about how she might not ever hear the sound again. She held the door open for Charles - using her elbow rather than her powers - and when he had passed her, she closed the door behind her and locked it up. She slid the key to the store into the pocket of her skirt. Exhaling quietly, she turned around and then blinked in surprise.

Charles was leaning up against a car and grinning; Erik was standing next to him, expression unreadable; but more importantly, Sean was standing next to Erik, eyes huge in confusion.

Their equally confused voices blended together.

"Sean?"

"Mrs. O, Charles said you were-"

"You are-"

 _"A mutant?_ " They said at the same time.

"Sorry for not telling you, Marianne," Charles called from where he was getting into the back seat of the car. "Wanted to surprise you!"

Marianne didn't look at Charles. "You-" she began before she shook her head. "Sean, you are not-"

"Why didn't you tell me?" Sean cried, looking hurt. His eyes widened in realization. "Those kids all said you could do magic! Tree said-"

_"What do you think you are doing with these men-"_

"Can you talk about this in the car?" Erik didn't ask it - he requested it as he himself got into the driver's seat. Marianne gave Sean a pointed look she knew clearly told him they would be continuing the conversation in the car. Sean gave her another look that spoke volumes about his sudden realization that the many kids who had claimed she was magic had not been lying or tricked.

The minute Marianne had slipped into the passenger seat and Sean had climbed into the back seat, Sean was bursting with questions. As Erik pulled out into the street, Sean was practically vibrating with newfound excitement. "So you're a mutant, too? How long have you known? When did Erik and Charles come and find you? They found me at the aquarium, it was so cool, when did they find you? So this is why Henry is staying with Mom and Dad until you get back? Wait, does Henry know? What-"

Marianne twisted in her seat to stare at him. "Sean, they told you what we are doing, didn't they?" She demanded. "How could you say yes to this?"

"Yeah, they told me what they're doing, it's fine-"

"He's eighteen," Charles spoke up. "Legally, it's all perfectly fine. He's an adult now, and he chose to do this."

Marianne gave Charles a withering look. "He is _barely_ an adult-"

"I'm eighteen!"

"- and any argument that starts with 'legally it is okay' is not a good one."

"Marianne," Erik said, drawing her focus away from Charles and onto him. "We told Sean everything we told you. We told him he could say no. He said yes." They came to a red light and he turned to look at her with piercing eyes. "We gave everyone a choice, just like we did with you. You were the only one to say no."

"You said 'no'?" Sean cried, aghast, before realizing the implications of this. He turned to Charles. "Then why are you here?" He demanded, still speaking to Marianne but looking at Charles with stormy eyes.

"I changed my mind, Sean, it's all okay," Marianne sighed. "No one forced me to do anything. They managed to convince me, but I agreed to it on my own. No need to worry."

Sean's face immediately went back to his cheerful expression. When Marianne looked into the backseat, Charles seemed to be a little rattled from Sean's glare.

"Sean, this is going to be dangerous," she said softly. "And you are so young. You shouldn't be-"

Sean smiled at her. "I know it'll be dangerous. They told me. But I'm eighteen, I can do this, I know I can. And it's a chance to find out what I can do! And there are others like me! How could I say no?"

 _Very easily,_ Marianne thought, but she didn't say that. She sighed. He was legally an adult, after all, despite still being a child in her eyes. She could do nothing to stop him. She could tell him off all she wanted, but Sean was allowed to do this no matter how much she disagreed with his choice. And, of course, she wanted him to meet others like them. Knowing there were other mutants made her feel not so alone, and she was thirty-one. She remembered being his age and feeling like she was the only one like her - meeting other mutants would be good for him. _And,_ she thought, _if anything threatens him, I will protect him._ She hoped she could count on the other mutants to help her protect the youngest member of their group.

A thought occurred to her. "Did you tell your parents about any of this?"

The sheepish smile was the only answer he gave her.

_"Sean!"_

"I'll tell them when I get back, It's not a big deal!"

"Of course it is!"

"What about Henry, does he know?"

"That is completely different! Henry is my son - and yes, he does know. Your parents are your parents! How can you leave them in the dark about something like this-"

Sean interrupted her angry questioning to turn to Charles and ask where they were going. Charles, who had been looking more and more alarmed as Marianne's voice had risen, was quick to respond. "Richmond, Virginia."

Turning around to face the front, Marianne looked into the rearview mirror and stared at Sean. "We'll be discussing this later," she promised. Sean nodded. She heard Erik chuckle next to her, and when she looked at him, he was smiling and looking ahead. "How are we getting there? We're not going to force Erik to drive the entire way, are we?"

"Charles doesn't know how to drive on this side of the road," Erik told her with a smirk.

"That's not true."

"He doesn't know how to drive _well_."

"That's also not true. We'll be driving to the airport, and we'll be taking my family's private plane to get to the CIA base."

"A private plane," Marianne repeated. _Naturally._

"A private plane?" Sean repeated at the same time, only in a much more excited tone.

If Charles responded, Marianne did not hear him - they were passing by Henry's school. It looked the same as any other school, but knowing her son was inside made it much more important than any other school.

 _I am doing this for him,_ she reminded herself.

"Henry will be fine, Mrs. O," Sean said. She glanced back at him. "He'll be safe with my parents. You know that, right?"

Marianne stared at him for a moment. She smiled. "Of course, he'll be fine."

"So, how long have you known about being a mutant?" Sean asked, going back to the questions he had asked her earlier.

"Since I was twelve or thirteen."

"And you never told me?!"

"It was something I had learned to keep secret. You never told me about you. Well done, by the way, keeping it a secret, you know you're not the best at it."

"You showed off to all those kids."

"Children are special. Adults cannot be trusted with something so important. Besides, children are usually ignored when they say things such as 'the lady from the bookstore has magic.' I showed you when you first came in, don't you remember?"

Sean frowned for a moment before his eyes lit up. "Oh, yeah! That was so long ago, I almost forgot."

"So, you two have known each other for how long?" Charles asked. He probably already knew the entire story, Marianne knew, but she smiled as Sean began to tell him.

As Sean entertained Charles with the story of how he and Marianne had met ("-so I was pretty young, I don't remember-" "Henry hadn't been born yet, you were five or six." "I was five or six, and her store was still pretty new, and I had never been inside, and she had baked this _amazing_ apple cake-") Marianne interjected with details Sean couldn't remember but otherwise stayed quiet. Halfway to the airport, Erik spoke to her in a low tone, so the boys in the backseat couldn't hear him.

"You can still change your mind," he said.

Marianne nodded. She knew she could. "Thank you," she said. "But I'm not changing my mind." There were too many things depending on this choice of hers. She needed the money. Of course, stopping Shaw was important as well, if he was even half as bad as they had told her, but keeping Henry safe was more important than anything else.

The thought of Henry reminded her of the note he had given her. She reached into her pocket and pulled it out. She held it between her index and middle fingers. "Henry gave me this note to give to you both. He told me not to read it."

Erik was driving, so Charles took it. She watched him read it in the rearview mirror. He looked torn between amusement and confusion. "What does it say, Charles?" Erik asked.

"' _Keep my mother safe,_ " Charles read, " _or all the mutant powers in the world won't be enough to keep you safe._ '" Charles looked up at Marianne. "Quite a protective boy, isn't he?"

"I'm on board with Henry with that," Sean said seriously.

Erik chuckled quietly.

Marianne smiled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Marianne is under the impression that the other mutants will all be adults closer to her age. She is completely wrong about this and she will not be happy to find out the truth.
> 
> Also, my sister insisted I keep this line in, so I compromised and made it a deleted scene:  
> "A private plane," Marianne repeated. She had thought Charles looked like a privileged piece of shit, and it looked like she had been right. 
> 
> Hope you liked this chapter! Don't be shy, leave a kudos and/or a comment, please.


	6. Discomfort

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which they arrive at the facility and Marianne discovers something alarming about the other recruits.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> French Translations:  
> Très impressionnant - Very Impressive
> 
> Anything in italics and underlined is spoken in French.

A state of unease, worry, or embarrassment; something that makes a person feel physically uncomfortable.

* * *

Marianne had never been on a plane before. Travelling by air had not been common when she was younger and would have needed it, and ever since she and Lawrence had made their home together, she had never had any need for it.

She found she did not like the experience very much. It was far too different from what she was used to. Her stomach lurched with each slight turn and every time it seemed to her that the plane dropped, her stomach dropped as well. She couldn't sleep because of the constant shifting of her stomach, and she kept the window shut for fear of looking down and panicking. She couldn't focus on her book, or even on continuing her conversation with Sean.

She would continue it later, she promised herself. Sean needed to be told exactly why his parents should know when he was putting his life in danger. 

If  _ Henry  _ was the one- she cut off that train of thought immediately, her heart clenching.

Sean was much more excited. He lounged back in his chair, looking out the window in amazement and chatting eagerly with Charles, who seemed just as happy to talk as Sean was, although he seemed more relaxed than either Sean or Marianne. _ Naturally,  _ she thought,  _ considering it is his plane. _

If Erik was either excited or nervous (neither were feelings Marianne could imagine him expressing openly), he kept quiet about it. He remained quiet except for an occasional comment on something Charles had said, reading a newspaper in one hand and rotating a pair of small metal balls around his fingers with the other. Marianne thought he looked like someone who travelled frequently, so she supposed he would look at ease.

Luckily, though, the flight was short and they landed in Richmond only about two hours after their departure (although that was still too long for her tastes). As they descended, Marianne gripped her armrests so tightly she was sure her nails had left rips in the fabrics.

"You okay, Mrs. O?" Sean asked as they got off the plane. 

"I'm fine." Her legs were shaking and she gripped her suitcase so tightly her knuckles were white. 

"First flight?" Charles asked her. He was ahead of them and looking back at her with a sympathetic smile.

Marianne tucked a lock of wavy hair behind her ear, exhaling deeply. "First flight in a plane, yes."

Charles nodded and faced forward. Then he swivelled around and stared at her again. "Can you... fly?"

"I do believe that's the face of pure joy, Marianne," Erik remarked dryly.

"I think you're right, Erik."

"Mrs. O, you can  _ fly _ ?!"

Marianne smiled at Sean's amazed expression. "I have always thought it was just an extension of my powers." She had shown Sean her abilities on the plane when he had requested it. When she had asked him to show his powers, he had winced and said he couldn't do it on the plane. "Perhaps it isn't flying so much as... levitating."

"How high?"

"Oh, I don't know, I've never bothered to see how high I can go. I've always been too worried about being seen."

"Well," Charles said, still grinning as though Christmas had come early, "you won't have to worry about that here. Everyone already knows about you, you won't have to hide a thing."

Marianne could not help but smile at the thought.

⭇⭁

It was an hour and a half drive to the CIA base, and it was a quiet one. Sean fell asleep for the first forty minutes, and Marianne, in an effort to recover from the trauma of the airplane, dozed off for the first half-hour. She was aware of Sean's head on her shoulder (she had chosen to get into the backseat for the drive to the base), distantly heard Charles and Erik having a quiet conversation, but she heard nothing they said. When she had rested long enough, she took part in some conversation with the two men. When Sean woke up he showed no embarrassment from his position and regained his excitement from earlier. Marianne found herself fiddling with her necklace, stroking the locket with increasing anxiety as they came closer and closer to the base.

The base was exactly what she expected from a government building, nothing more, nothing less. It was all straight lines and angles, brick, some windows. She noticed a strange-looking spherical building in the surrounding field but did not ask what it was for. When they pulled up in the driveway, there were two people waiting at the foot of the steps to the building.

One was a man. He looked shorter than Erik but taller than Charles, but what he lacked in height he made up for in girth, being a very round man. He wore a black suit and tie, dressed as a typical government agent, but it did nothing to distract from the kind expression he wore as they all got out of the car.

"These are the new recruits?" He asked, practically beaming with excitement as he approached them. He held out his hand to Marianne. "Agent Platt, so nice to meet you."

"Marianne Ouellet," she replied, taking his hand and giving it a firm shake. "Wonderful to meet you as well," she said with a smile. When he did not take this as a gesture to wink or attempt to flirt and instead only smiled earnestly back at her, Marianne decided she liked him.

"Hey, I'm Sean," Sean introduced himself as the agent turned to him. "Sean Cassidy."

As they shook hands, Marianne's attention was drawn to the woman who had been waiting with Agent Platt. She had stepped forward once Plath had gone to Sean and now held her hand out as well. "Agent Moira MacTaggert, pleased to meet you, Ms. Ouellet. Thank you for joining us."

Moira MacTaggert stood straight and with both feet firmly planted on the ground. Her brown hair was cut straight across at her shoulders; long enough to tie back but not long enough to get in the way if she couldn't. She did not wear a suit and tie like Agent Plath, and instead was dressed in a nice blouse and a matching dark navy blue jacket and skirt. She was the same height as Marianne, and a glance down let her know that Agent MacTaggert would be about two inches shorter than Marianne without heels. Everything about the woman told Marianne that she was not to be ignored, and, considering she was a woman working for the government, presumably in a very important role given her current responsibilities, Marianne could not ignore her.

"It is no problem," Marianne said, smiling as she shook Agent MacTaggert's hand. "Charles did tell you about my request, yes?"

Agent MacTaggert nodded. "It's not a problem."

"It's the least we could do," Platt interjected. As Sean shook hands with Platt, MacTaggert put her hands on her hips and turned to Erik and Charles.

"Platt and I have a meeting with the board in half an hour," she said. It didn't mean anything to Marianne. It did to Charles and Erik, who each had their separate reaction; Charles responded by straightening up and looking serious, while Erik's eyes seemed to darken.

"What about?" Charles asked. Marianne exchanged a look with Sean.

"Shaw?" Erik demanded, his voice sharp.

_ There it is again, _ Marianne thought. His fists had clenched and his body had gone rigid. She would ask him about it later, she decided.

MacTaggert nodded. "We think we have his location."

"We'll see if we can get the board to approve of this project," Platt said with a broad grin.

"It's still up in the air right now," MacTaggert explained to Marianne and Sean. "The board isn't quite comfortable with letting, in their words, 'a bunch of untrained freaks' into a precarious situation such as this." She sighed. "We're going into this meeting to see if they've changed their minds, now that we know where Shaw is."

Marianne thought about glaring at the two men who had acted like the whole situation was settled and had led her to believe it was certain she would be fighting. She decided against it, choosing instead to shoot an incredulous look at the two of them. Charles had the decency to look apologetically at her. Erik merely shrugged, as though to say,  _ well, what can we do? _

"But that's our problem," Platt assured them, patting Sean on the shoulder. "I'm sure you two are eager to see your rooms and get comfortable. And of course, meet the rest of the mutants."

"Do you plan to collect more?" Marianne asked as Moira led them up the stairs. "More mutants, I mean."

"Don't get him started," Erik said with a sigh. Marianne understood a moment later when Charles began to passionately explain how many mutants he had found (using Cerebro, he explained, pointing at the spherical building Marianne had noticed, which he then explained was a sort of machine that expanded his powers across the world, and it had been made by Hank McCoy, she'd meet him later) and how they planned to go to as many of them as they could and recruit them - not just to fight Shaw, but to help them all.

"That's how we found you, you know," Charles added. "But there were so many of us, so many minds, all of them filled with so many possibilities. We just need to help them, with their powers and their ambitions and everything, and we can change the world. It will be far bigger than just this, just you wait and see, Marianne, Sean, it will be  _ amazing _ ."

"I can't wait," Sean exclaimed, his young face beaming. "And we're apart of this. We're the very beginning. Mrs. O, isn't it  _ awesome _ ?"

Marianne found herself nodding, a smile growing. Finding those who needed help and helping them, helping them in ways most others could not - it was a wonderful thought. It was not one she had thought Charles would follow. She wondered if Erik had the same belief.

She glanced over at Erik. He wore a sour look on his face.  _ It appears not. _

"It is  _ very _ awesome," Charles agreed eagerly.

"I hope it will all go well," Marianne said quietly, her eyes drawn back to the spherical building. It bothered her a bit to know that she had been tracked and found so easily, through her mind no less. But if the machine could help find people who needed help, she could handle her own discomfort. She wondered if the machine worked both ways - if she could ask Charles to use it so she could communicate with Henry.

Marianne shook that thought away. That would be too strange. A phone call would be enough.

"Ms. Ouellet," MacTaggert said.

"Yes?"

"Your accent is French, isn't it?"

"French-Canadian, actually," Marianne corrected. "I am from Montreal."

"Are you? I spent some time there a few years ago, it's a wonderful city."

"Yes, it is."

MacTaggert looked back at her over her shoulder and said in perfect French,  _ "Did the boys catch you on a trip to the States?" _

Marianne inhaled sharply, a beautiful smile spreading across her face.  " _ No, I have lived here for just over a decade,"  _ she replied.  _ " _ _ You sound like you've spent time in a French country. You speak without flaw." _

Agent MacTaggert gave a small hint of a smile.  _ " _ _ When you're on a mission in a foreign country, you have to sound like a native." _

Marianne laughed. That was certainly true. God above, she had missed having someone who knew French as well as she did. Henry knew his mother's language very well, having spoken it since birth, but growing up in a country where English had to be his primary language made it slightly harder for him to speak French as well as she did. Sean spoke French as well as someone could when they had only learned it as an elective in school.

_ "But if you don't mind me asking, " _ Agent MacTaggert continued,  _ " _ _ I'm curious as to how a French-Canadian mutant woman ended up living in the States for twelve years." _ Agent MacTaggert glanced over at her. As they had been walking, Marianne had picked up her pace until she fell in step with the agent. Now they walked side-by-side.

Marianne caught the slight emphasis placed on 'mutant'.  _ " _ _ That is a long story, and one that will have to wait for another time,"  _ she said.

Agent MacTaggert nodded, a hint of curiosity in her eyes, before stopping in the middle of a long hallway that did not look any different from the other hallways. "These are the rooms," she said. "Some will have to share, as there are limited spaces for everyone and we're expecting more mutants, sooner or later."

"I'm afraid we weren't able to make them more comfortable," Agent Platt said apologetically, stepping around Marianne and joining Agent MacTaggert at her side. "I wish we could have customized them a bit more, made them more... well, homey."

"This is a government building, you see," said Agent MacTaggert, not as apologetic as Agent Platt. "We were a bit limited in what we could provide while still keeping things professional."

Charles interrupted at this point, following Platt in stepping around Marianne. "Hopefully," he said with a slight laugh, "depending on the time spent here, you'll be able to customize your rooms as you like."

"Ms. Ouellet," began Agent MacTaggert.

"Marianne, please," Marianne said quickly. Agent MacTaggert nodded.

"Marianne," she continued as though she hadn't been interrupted, "this is your room. You don't have anyone to share your space with, just yet. Mr. Cassidy-"

"Sean."

"Sean, your room is next door. You're sharing with one of the other recruits, Hank McCoy. You'll meet him soon."

"All of the recruits are in one of the break rooms," Agent Platt explained. "You can go meet them once you've settled in."

Agent MacTaggert looked down at her watch. "So sorry to leave you now, but our meeting is in fifteen minutes, and we're going to either have a lot of convincing to do or a lot of information to receive, so Agent Platt and I both need to be ready." After another handshake with both Agent Platt and Agent MacTaggert, both agents disappeared around a corner, leaving Marianne and Sean with Charles and Erik.

"Erik and I will leave you to get comfortable," Charles said with a pat on Sean's back. "Whenever you're ready, the break rooms are just back down this hallway and all the way down the first hall on the left. You won't be able to miss them. They're a distinct group." With another smile, he and Erik walked away.

Marianne watched them go and then turned to stare at Sean. He winced.

"Can we talk about it later? Like... not now?"

Marianne quirked an eyebrow and stared at him for a few seconds longer with an unimpressed look, letting him squirm. Then she sighed and smiled. "Later," she promised. "Not tonight. But soon," she added firmly, pointing a finger at him, but the smile on her face made her seem less than stern.

Sean grinned. "You're awesome, Mrs. O." He opened the door to his room and stepped inside, shutting it behind him. A second later he emerged. "Done settling in."

Marianne rolled her eyes.  _ Men _ .

"I'm gonna go meet the other mutants. You coming?" Sean continued, pointing a thumb over his shoulder and down the hallway where they had come from, already beginning to take steps backward.

Marianne nodded. "Go without me, I'll be in a moment." Sean gave her two thumbs up before turning around and jogging down the hall, disappearing as he turned the corner. Marianne opened her door and stepped in.

The size was the first thing she noticed. The room was larger than her bedroom at home, being fifteen feet long and ten feet wide, but rather than seeming more comfortable because of the larger size, it was exactly as the agents had described it. A single bed was shoved into the corner, covered in stiff-looking white sheets and a navy-blue comforter, as well as a lighter blue blanket with silk edges that she knew, from experience, was not as soft as it looked. There was a small wooden table next to the bed with a lamp and a digital clock, both unplugged. There wasn't any place to put clothes or other belongings except on the table, under the bed, or on the floor. The walls were the same grey concrete the building was and had the same lighting as the hallways – rectangular panels in a single line – with only a single square window that was maybe two feet long in length and width.

Marianne approached the window and looked out. She had a view of the Cerebro building and the road. Wonderful.

_ You're not on a vacation,  _ she reminded herself.  _ You're here for Henry. _

Marianne set her suitcase on the bed and opened it up. She took out her book and set it on the table. She took out her framed photo of Lawrence and Henry (then only three years old) and placed it next to the book. There were other items in her suitcase that could be organized later. Her clothes could not be put anywhere, so she figured she would leave them in the suitcase.

She sat on the bed, grimacing at the feel of the scratchy blanket underneath her legs, and looked around. She sighed as she looked at the photograph. It was one of the few photos she had taken of her family; Lawrence was always the one to insist on documenting their family's life, and the one with the skill to take good photos. True to form, the photo she had taken was crooked and somewhat blurry, but she could still make out the joy in her husband and son's faces. She smiled, wondering what Lawrence would have said about her actions. He probably would have worried, would have made plans for any possible disaster they could encounter, but never would have tried to stop her once she had made a firm decision.

Marianne flicked her wrist and her suitcase closed and zipped itself up before floating underneath the bed. There was no reason to put off meeting her teammates for any longer.

The hallways were completely empty, which was unsettling. She found herself fiddling more with her locket and held kept slipping her hands into her pockets to make sure her knife and book were still there. (Her knife always came with her, and her book was just in case nothing interesting happened.)

She turned a corner and found a large door with loud music playing on the other side. As Charles had said, it had not taken her long to find the other mutants. Marianne grabbed the handle of the door and pulled it open. The laughter and chatter in the room slowed down as she stepped through the doorway and shut the door behind her. She brushed a curl of hair out of her eyes as she turned around and asked, "Is this where the other mutants are?"

Sean, who was lounging in a small armchair, raised a glass of what was probably soda in greeting. "Hey, welcome to the party!" he cheered, grinning at her. He turned to the other people in the room, all of whom were sitting on the assortment of sleek black leather couches and armchairs in a circle in the center of the room. "That's Mrs. O."

One of the people stood up to greet her. It was a young, blonde girl, dressed in a sleeveless black turtleneck and a short skirt. She was only a few inches shorter than Marianne and was slender and small, but the energy she gave off made up for the lack of space she took up. She had a slight bounce in her step as she approached Marianne, sticking her hand out in greeting before she even got close to her.

"Hi!" she said eagerly. "I'm Raven. Sean was just telling us about you, and Charles said we had two new mutants, so we were wondering when you'd show up."

Marianne stared at her, examining the girl's face – she  _ was _ a girl, a young woman. She couldn't have been much older than twenty.

Realizing she had been staring in silence for a second too long, Marianne broke out of her trance and smiled back, taking Raven's hand and shaking it. "Hello, Raven. I'm Marianne. It's wonderful to meet you, and the rest of you, as well..." she trailed off as she looked at the group of people in the room.

They were all so  _ young _ . Sean was easily the youngest, but the others did not seem much older than him. The blond boy sitting slouched on the couch, filled with tension and wariness but clearly trying to hide it, was  _ maybe _ nineteen at the most. A pretty dark-haired girl sat across from him on another couch, sitting in a way that made her seem a little older (like she was  _ intentionally  _ trying to seem older), but she still looked only about twenty. There was a lanky brunet boy with glasses and a blazer and tie who was probably twenty. The eldest in the room, besides her, was the African American man, who sat looking relaxed and looked perhaps twenty-five. Besides him, everyone else in the room couldn't have been older than twenty-one, maybe twenty-two if she was generous.

An ill feeling settled in her stomach, but she forced a smile and looked back at Raven. "It's wonderful to be here. I never thought that I would ever get the chance to meet others like myself."

The black man chuckled. "Neither did any of us."

"But we're all here," Raven said, smiling brightly. "And it's amazing, isn't it?"

"You realize we're going into war, right?" the blond boy said. The ill feeling in Marianne's stomach lurched. "It's not like we're at summer camp or something."

Raven scoffed and rolled her eyes. "I know that, Alex. That doesn't mean we can't be excited about this whole thing." She rolled her eyes again and turned back to Marianne. "You hungry? Or thirsty? There's a mini-fridge in the corner, it's great."

Marianne nodded. "Yes, I am feeling very thirsty right now," she said, unable to hide the slight rasp in her voice. She cleared her throat and went to get a bottle of water. When she returned, she sat down on the only free chair left, a sleek black armchair on the other end of the table from Sean and the blond boy, and looked around the circle.

"So," she said, and all eyes turned onto her. "Who are all of you? I know Sean already." Sean raised his glass in salute to her again.

"Yeah, he's already told us," the blond boy said, rolling his eyes. Marianne stared at him with a raised eyebrow before she smiled.

" _ Oui _ ," she said. "And you are?"

"Alex. Summers."

"Well, Alex, it's nice to meet you," she said with a kind smile. "Alex... that's a good name. I have heard it means 'defender of men.' It seems appropriate, considering our circumstances." She looked around the room, examining the table covered in half-eaten snacks, the pinball machine in the corner, the jukebox against the wall, the bar on the other side of the room - all of it, even the lights over their heads, were just distractions, trying to help them forget what they would be facing so very soon.

"You're very brave, to be doing this" she continued, looking back to Alex. He was staring at her, bewildered. "All of you are," she added earnestly, looking around the circle of young adults. They all seemed just as taken aback by her comment; some - the boy in glasses and the dark-haired girl - even seemed flustered or flattered by it.

A beat of silence.

Finally, Alex scoffed and muttered, "Whatever," running his hand over his hair as though trying to tidy it up.

"So, he's Alex," Marianne started over, looking back around the circle with a smile. "Who are the rest of you?"

The dark-haired girl casually raised her hand. "Angel Salvadore. Love your shoes." Marianne looked down at her shoes and smiled, thanked her, and said she loved her dress. Angel smiled.

"Most people just call me Darwin," the black man said, holding out his hand for Marianne to shake. She did so without hesitation. "Nice to meet you."

"Nice to meet you, too, Darwin. Another fascinating name," she said. She looked at the two members sitting on the couch - Raven and the boy with glasses. "And you?"

The boy with glasses smiled in greeting. "I'm, uh, Hank, Hank McCoy."

Marianne's eyes lit up with recognition. "The Hank McCoy who built the machine out there?" She gestured to Cerebro, which they could see out the floor-to-ceiling window overlooking the field beside the building. "Charles mentioned you earlier. That's quite an accomplishment!  _ Très impressionnant. _ "

Hank grinned but ducked his head almost bashfully. "Thanks."

Marianne smiled as she looked around the group. She took another sip of water before asking, "If you don't mind, how old are all of you?"

Raven spoke up. "I don't mind answering - I'm twenty-eight."

Marianne promptly choked on her water. Apparently, no one else had known this either, because they all began staring at Raven.

"Twenty-eight?" Darwin asked with a raised eyebrow. "Really?"

Raven grinned, almost seeming proud. "Yup. Most people are surprised when I tell 'em. I think it's something to do with my mutation. Hank can back me up when he's studied my blood sample," she added, glancing at Hank, who looked flustered under Raven's attention, Marianne noticed.

_ Maybe all of them have mutations to make them look younger? _ Marianne wondered. If that was the case, it would put her at ease.

But alas, this was  _ not  _ the case; Hank was twenty (he would turn twenty-one in December), Alex had turned nineteen a couple of months ago, and Angel was nineteen as well. Darwin was twenty-five, as she had guessed. Darwin's age put her slightly at ease, but as for the rest of them, all she could feel was the ill feeling. They were so young, barely adults, and here they were about to go to  _ war _ . Sean had told her that Charles and Erik had explained everything to him, and they had done so for her as well, so most likely they all knew what they were getting themselves into, but even so - how could the two men have gone after only young adults? Surely there had to be other fully grown adults, like her, like themselves - surely they could not have been  _ that  _ rare that none could be found.

And these young adults - children, they were  _ children  _ \- joining a war - were they like Sean, joining for the excitement of meeting others like them? Or were they like her, joining to protect someone or something? Or - her stomach lurched at the thought - did they just have  _ no reason  _ to  _ not  _ fight? To not risk their lives?

She'd ask Charles. She'd ask Erik. She would demand to know how they could justify this, asking people so young to join their fight. Things could not have been so desperate and hopeless that they were looking to people not even old enough to  _ vote  _ to save the world.

And she would ask them - or the people themselves - why any of them would say yes to a thing like this. She had to know how they could risk throwing their lives away for this. It was a brave thing they were doing, like she had told them, but it wasn't something that should have been put on their shoulders.

She thought of Henry and had to repress a shudder at the thought of him being put in such a position. Hopefully, he never would be.

"I am thirty-one," she said, just because it was only fair. "And I'm glad to meet all of you. Cheers." She raised her drink in the air with a smile. They all smiled back - with the exception of Alex, who rolled his eyes - and copied her gesture.

Marianne watched them take a drink. She studied their faces. They were young. They were so young.  

She looked down at her water before taking a long sip, almost wishing for something stronger.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> French Translations:  
> Très impressionnant - Very Impressive
> 
> We've finally reached the actual plot!
> 
> Now, according to the age the actors were when they played these characters in First Class, most of the team should be in their early to late twenties, with Darwin being the oldest at 32 (same age as Erik). However, the fact that Charles and Erik kept calling them 'kids' throws me off, since I feel like they wouldn't call them kids if they were older than say, 22. Charles might, but Erik definitely wouldn't. So I aged them down a bit, except for Raven, who I had to age up from Jennifer Lawrence's age at the time of filming. I assume that Charles and Erik wouldn't have gone after anyone younger than 18, but with the situation at hand, they wouldn't think much about getting people only a bit older than 18.
> 
> Hope you liked this chapter! Don't be shy, leave a kudos and/or a comment, please.


	7. Introduction

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which Marianne learns more about her fellow mutants and blood is spilled.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anything in italics and underlined is spoken in French.
> 
> TW: Canon-typical violence.

The action of introducing something; a formal presentation of one person to another, in which each is told the other's name.

* * *

"So, you're Charles's little sister?" Marianne asked with surprise. She never would have guessed - Charles seemed too much like an only child.

"If anything, I'm his adopted sister," Raven said with a grin. "But we're more like childhood friends who've always lived together."

"What are the chances of that?" Darwin laughed. "Adopting another mutant!"

"You're lucky, you got to meet another mutant early on," Sean said almost enviously. He glanced at Marianne. "Or you  _ knew  _ you had met another."

"I told you, I showed you when we first met," Marianne said. "It isn't my fault you forgot. And I could say the same about you."

Raven laughed, but it sounded a bit forced. "Yeah. Lucky."

Marianne stared at her, brows furrowed in concern. Raven met her eyes, gave a smile that wasn't really a smile, and looked away.

* * *

"A son?"

Marianne nodded. "Yes, he's twelve. He is staying with some friends while I am here."

"What's his name?" Raven asked eagerly.

"Henry Schulman," Marianne said. "He has my husband's last name."

"And you don't?" Angel questioned. Sean shot her a look. Angel glared right back when she noticed.

Marianne shrugged. "I started using my maiden name again after he died. My last name still is Schulman, but I prefer Ouellet." She smiled a little sadly. There had been too many memories attached to the name Schulman for her to keep using it. Her last name was still legally Schulman, however, as it would have made things too complicated to have a different last name than Henry.

"I wouldn't have pegged you as a mom," Angel said, clearly sensing this was a sensitive topic. "You don't seem like one."

Sean laughed and Angel shot him another look. Marianne gave him a look as well and he stopped laughing, though he was clearly still smiling as he drank his soda.

* * *

 

"A  _ stripper _ ?" Marianne repeated, barely managing to keep the horror out of her voice.

"It pays the bills, and I'm good at it," Angel said, sounding a bit defensive.

"I get it," Darwin said. "You have to do what you have to do. I was a cab driver before I got here. That's how Charles and Erik found me. They got into my cab and told me to drive them all the way to Richmond. We were in  _ New York _ ."

This diverted into a conversation about what they had all been doing when Charles and Erik had come to find them. Alex was cagey about his answer, whereas Sean happily told everyone about bringing his little sister to the aquarium. Hank described how Charles had accidentally exposed him when they met, as Hank worked with the CIA even before their arrival. Raven sighed and rolled her eyes when Marianne described the men's almost predatory arrival in her store. But even as the conversation continued to flow, she kept glancing at Angel. The girl was only  _ nineteen _ , and she had been a  _ stripper _ . Marianne was no stranger to sex workers; she had grown up in the Depression and had witnessed many prostitutes in her neighbourhood trying to make ends meet. Had Angel chosen to become a stripper? Or had she become one because she had no other choice?

Marianne really needed a drink.

* * *

 

"We should come up with code names," Raven suggested during a lull in the conversation.

Marianne, who had been thinking about taking out the book in her pocket as she examined the array of snacks in the fridge, looked over at her. "Any particular reason?"

"We are government agents, after all," Raven said with a shrug. "We should have secret code names."

"Do government agents have secret code names?" Marianne asked with a slight frown. She had never been one for the spy thriller novels, so she wasn't sure if agents really had code names or not. Even then, she doubted the authenticity of such novels. She shut the fridge when she realized that most of the food in the fridge was junk food.  _ Disgusting _ .

"Yeah, of course they do," Sean said as she returned to her seat. "Everyone knows that."

"I want to be called Mystique," Raven said.

" _ Mystique -  _ French for 'mystical.' Very nice choice, but of course, I'm biased."

"Someone approves!" Raven gave her a thumbs up. "Mystique it is, then!"

"Damn, I wanted to be called Mystique," Sean joked.

"Well, tough, I called it," Raven teased back. As she spoke, a ripple of what looked like blue scales ran over her body, too quick for Marianne to process what she was seeing until it was over and there were two Sean's sitting across from each other. The original Sean jumped in his seat, startled at the appearance of a second him, while everyone else had the same reaction or whooped at Raven's display of her powers. Marianne laughed in delight, especially as Raven-Sean smiled almost seductively at the real Sean and said, "And I'm  _ way  _ more mysterious than you."

As everyone clapped for Raven, both she and Angel laughing at Sean's surprise, she turned back to her original self so quickly Marianne could have blinked and missed it.

"How about you, Darwin?" Raven asked as the applause died down.

Darwin considered the question for a moment. "Well, Darwin is already a nickname, and it fits - adapt to survive, and all." When he noticed their curious stares, he smiled and stood up. "Watch this."

And so they watched as Darwin approached a fish tank on one side of the room, confidence evident in his every step, and they watched as Darwin stuck his head into the water. To their amazement, giant gills grew out of the sides of his face, and as Darwin proved to them by opening his mouth underwater, they worked as actual gills did.

"Amazing!" Marianne declared, clapping with the rest of the team. Everyone was laughing and cheering as Darwin pulled his head out of the water and shook himself dry. "Truly, amazing!"

"Thank you, thank you," Darwin accepted their praise with open arms, grinning at them all. He pointed right at Sean. "What about you?"

"Ooh, yes, Sean, what about you?" Marianne asked eagerly. She leaned forward, placing her chin on her fist and propping up her arm on her knee. What could he do here that he couldn't do on the plane? It must have been something less self-centred than Raven's or Darwin's, or he would have been able to show her.

"I'm going to be..." Sean leaned forward, thought for a second, and grinned. "Banshee."

Of course, honouring his Irish heritage with his name would be the obvious move for him to make. _ But why Banshee?  _ Marianne wondered. Hank asked what she had been thinking, and instead of answering Hank's question, Sean grinned once more and stood up.

"Mrs. O, you might want to step out of the way," he said, gesturing for her to move. Marianne stood up and moved behind the couch where Raven and Hank sat, now even more curious as she watched Sean crouch down in front of the table. "Everyone, cover your ears."

Marianne put her fingers in her ears. Once everyone had done the same, Sean inhaled, looked at both sides of the room to make sure they were watching (Marianne smiled encouragingly at him, which made him smile in return), and gave an absolutely piercing whistle that completely shattered the second ceiling-to-floor window, opposite to the one overlooking Cerebro. The window, now in millions of tiny pieces of glass, crashed to the floor, some of the shards spilling into the break room while other pieces fell into the garden outside. Marianne had to react quickly so none of the pieces hit anybody, but no one noticed her casual display of power. It was clear from Sean's embarrassed expression that he had not meant to hit the window, but rather the glasses on the table lined up in a perfect row. However, as everybody was laughing in delight over his display of power rather than at his mistake, he didn't seem too bothered by it.

"Amazing, Sean," Marianne repeated her praise of Darwin's powers, shaking her head in awe. She understood why he couldn't show her before. "Absolutely amazing!  _ Incroyable _ !"

It  _ was  _ amazing; it was amazing how suddenly, after years of hiding their powers from the world, everyone was so ready to show what they could do. They were among people like them now, and they could show off what they had hidden their entire lives. Marianne could feel the energy rising in the room with each new display of power and could feel herself getting swept along with it. She wanted to show these people what she could do.

She cast a glance at the shattered pieces of the window. "Sean."

"Yeah, I know." Sean sighed, messing up his hair. "I'll fix it."

"How?" Angel laughed. Sean shrugged, grinning unashamedly.

Marianne shook her head at the destruction, but a thought was forming in her mind.

Angel stood up, now grinning cockily as she slipped off her leather jacket. "My stage name was Angel," she said. As she took off her jacket she revealed an intricate series of tattoos on her back and shoulders that looked like the pattern of a dragonfly's wings. "It kind of fits."

Just as quickly as Raven had changed forms, the tattoos on Angel's back split from her body, growing membrane and veins, forming wings that looked exactly like a dragonfly's. They even shimmered in different colours as dragonfly wings did, and the way they fluttered made it obvious they were not just for decoration.

"You can  _ fly _ ?" Raven marvelled. Angel grinned over her shoulder.

"That's not all." Angel turned to look into the garden. She seemed to focus on something, took a deep breath, and spat. A flaming ball of  _ something _ flew from her mouth, arcing over the garden and landing on the head of a statue in the center of the garden. As the statue began to dissolve and smoke rose from the smouldering head, Marianne realized that Angel had just spat out acid.

While the rest whooped in absolute delight at the destruction of property, Marianne wondered for a second if she should try to calm them down. A window and now a statue were broken, and this was a government building, after all.

When she looked around at everyone's utterly joyful expressions, though, she couldn't bring herself to. They were like her; they had been alone for so long (except for Raven), and they were finally in the presence of others just like them. She couldn't bring down their spirits right as they had started to rise. If things got worse, then she would step in.

Angel smiled at Hank as she pulled her jacket back on. "How about you?"

Hank looked down on his feet. Marianne, who hadn't moved back to her chair since Sean had told her to get out of the way, couldn't see his expression, but she saw the tension in his shoulders at Angel's question. Hank hadn't shown them his mutation, but he had briefly described it to them earlier, and the clear reluctance in his voice and on his face as he had done so kept anyone from asking him more questions about his ape-like oversized feet.

"How about Bigfoot?" Alex asked.

Marianne looked over at him with a frown. He had sounded just a bit too mocking for his comment to be friendly teasing. Even if it had been meant as teasing, it was over the line - Hank looking away and the way his shoulders raised was proof of that.

"Alex, that was uncalled for," she said.

The few chuckles that had started at Alex's comment quickly faded. Alex blinked at her, taken aback. Marianne stared at him, a small, disappointed frown on her face. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see that everyone was either looking at her or at Alex or looking back and forth between the two of them.

"Um." Alex looked around at the room. Marianne watched as he looked to Sean, who mouthed something at him. He finally turned back to Marianne, stared at her a few seconds, before he finally looked back at Hank. "Uh, sorry, man?"

Hank sounded just as bewildered as Alex looked when he said, "It's fine."

Marianne nodded, satisfied with this. She could have left the comment go, but with Hank's clear discomfort with his mutation and his reaction to Alex's teasing, she couldn't bring herself to. As she perched on the back of the couch - her own chair was right in the path of disaster, as Sean and Angel had both proved - she noticed Hank glance up at her with confusion in his eyes. She casually patted Hank's shoulder.

Darwin cleared his throat and asked, "Alex, what is your gift? What can you do?"

The initial stunned silence of the room was broken. Alex shook his head as though trying to clear it. "I, uh, I can't do it. Not in here."

"What about outside?" Marianne asked, gesturing to the garden outside the broken window.

"Yeah, can you do it out there?" Darwin asked. The rest of the group started asking the same question, prodding him to show his powers outside until they began to chant his name. Alex looked more and more reluctant with every passing second as their chant rose in volume, until finally he sighed, set down his drink and stood up. Everyone cheered.

As Alex approached the window, grumbling all the way, Marianne said, "Alex, you don't have to do anything if you don't want to."

Alex looked back at her as the others groaned in protest.

"I'm serious," She insisted over their groaning. "You don't have to show us if you're uncomfortable." Even though Alex had made Hank uncomfortable, it wouldn't be right for him to be pressured into showing them his powers if he was truly worried about them.

Alex stared at her for a second. Then he scoffed and said, "I'm fine,  _ mom _ , don't worry about it."

Marianne raised her hands in defence, although she hadn't taken offence to his tone. "Alright, I only wanted to make sure you knew."

"Okay, well,  _ whatever _ ," was Alex's reply. He stepped over the remains of the broken window and onto the concrete sidewalk running around the perimeter of the garden. "Get down when I tell you."

Marianne couldn't help but smile as she heard Sean and Raven mocking Alex's warning as they all followed him to the window. As glass crunched underneath her shoes, however, she fiddled with her locket. He had been so reluctant to show them. What could he do that he couldn't do in the room, and what could his powers do that made him so resistant to showing them?

She and the rest of them leaned out the window, watching as Alex stood in a corner of the garden and faced the still smoking statue. As he was steeling himself, he glanced over and noticed them leaning out and staring at him. He told them to get back. Marianne was the only one who didn't, but the rest leaned forward again only two seconds after they leaned back. Alex noticed and gestured more forcefully, repeating, "Get  _ back _ !", but this time, none of them listened.

" _ Whatever _ ," Alex repeated under his breath, turning back to the statue and beginning to rotate his body in circles. As he did, his body began to glow red.

Marianne's eyes grew wide as fluorescent red rings of pure energy burst forth from his skin, swirling around and across his body as he continued to rotate, almost reminding her of hula hoops. Alex had started slow, but as he continued, he began to spin faster and faster, and the rings responded to his speed - they started flying out in all directions, aimless and dangerous. They did as Alex had asked them to, finally - they leaned back and ducked, some of them even yelping as one of the rings flew right by them, with Darwin stepping in front of Raven and Angel, the two closest to him, and Marianne instinctively raising her hands. The rings sizzled as they flew, hitting the walls, the ground, and nearly everything surrounding them, leaving only black burn marks and gashes on every surface they met. The statue was sliced in two with no effort whatsoever, the top half tumbling to the ground, both halves flaming where they had been cut.

The rings stopped flying after the statue fell over. There was a second of stunned silence before Raven let out a shocked laugh that led the way for more laughter and cheering.

Marianne continued to stare at the damage along the walls and ground, her mouth slightly open. No wonder Alex had been so reluctant to show them.

As Alex stepped back into the room, looking a little proud of himself, Marianne closed her mouth, shook her head and clapped along with the rest of them.

She had discovered her powers when they had activated on their own. Until she had learned some sense of control, things had reacted without her consent. A glass would shatter when she got upset. A chair would fly to the ceiling when she got angry. Objects would float harmlessly in circles when she was excited. Things happened whether she wanted them to or not.

What sort of things could have happened to these teens when they were still learning? When their powers were still developing? When they didn't know what was happening to them or what they could even do?

She swallowed hard.

"What do you got?" She heard Alex ask, bringing her out of her thoughts.

"See, I don't know!" Raven said.

"We'll think of something soon," Sean said. "How about Sparky?"

"No," came Alex's flat reply.

"Energizer."

"No."

"Hula."

" _ No _ ."

"We'll think of something," Raven said. "Promise."

"I'll keep my fingers crossed," Alex remarked sarcastically before he turned to Marianne. He crossed his arms and raised his eyebrows almost challengingly. "How about you?"

Marianne raised an eyebrow and smiled as she turned to the broken window. She held out her hands, palms facing up; every single piece of broken glass scattered across the ground, no matter how small or unnoticeable, rose into the air, flying out from underneath the chairs and couches, rising out of the carpet, pulling themselves free from underneath people's shoes. She turned her hands over, and the glass flew to the window, putting themselves back together like a puzzle. Marianne didn't have to think about which pieces fit together - they simply went back to where they were supposed to be, each of them fitting perfectly into place.

While the pieces were in place, they weren't fixed. It was still obvious the window was broken. Marianne focused, imagining the shards melting into each other, mending, the cracks between them disappearing as they became one again.

There were faint crackling noises as the cracks in the glass slowly faded away, leaving behind one whole, perfect window.

Marianne lowered her hands and smiled as the young adults around her cheered. Because she was in the mood for showing off a bit, she flicked her wrist. Out in the garden, the statue's flames had mostly died down, but a few sparks flew as the top half lifted from the ground and spun in the air before settling down on the bottom half. She stared at the statue and the pieces came together - a little uneven, but in one piece again. It was still smoking and a chunk of the head had been dissolved, but for the most part, it was fixed.

"Let's keep our celebration a little more contained, yes?" Marianne asked.

"That was awesome!" Raven cried, ignoring Marianne's request. "So, like, you can control things?"

"Telekinesis?" Hank supplied the word.

"Yes!" Raven pointed at him enthusiastically. "Thank you, Hank!"

"That is what I can do, yes," Marianne said, grinning. She held out her hand and her glass of water floated from the table and into her hand. She took a sip, paused, and then said, "For the record, I will not be cleaning up anyone else's mess."

"Oh, come on," Alex groaned. "Lighten up!" Angel and Sean both agreed, lightly teasing her ("Lighten up, Marianne!" "Yeah, lighten up, Mrs. O!"). Marianne rolled her eyes.  _ Teenagers _ .

(And  _ god _ , her heart panged at the reminder.)

"Relax, you guys," Darwin laughed. "Alex, you heard her, no more messes."

"I wasn't the only one who destroyed something!"

"Any ideas for a name, Raven?" She asked, ignoring Alex's protests and complaining, Angel and Sean's teasing and the slight pain.

"None."

"Well, I'm sure you'll think of something wonderful." Marianne glanced at the clock on the wall. Would the meeting be over by now? Almost an hour had passed, surely it had to be over. "Do you have any ideas for Charles or Erik?"

"Didn't you say Charles just became a professor?" Angel asked, appearing at Raven's side and flashing Marianne a grin. "How about Egghead?"

The two younger girls laughed. "Maybe," Raven joked. "I'll keep it in mind."

"And Erik? What's a name for him?"

"I had an idea, actually," Hank spoke up. When everyone turned to him, he looked down at his hands. "Maybe."

"What was it?" Marianne asked.

Hank glanced around at the room before his eyes landed on Raven. "Well, Erik controls metal, right? Well, more accurately, he controls the magnetic fields. There's this machine, an electrical generator, actually, which uses permanent magnets to produce periodic pulses of alternating current. It's called a magneto, and a permanent magnet produces magnetic fields, and since that's Erik's power, I thought-"

"Oh!" Raven clapped her hands together, interrupting Hank's rambling. "I get it! Oh, that's perfect, Hank!"

"Nerd," Alex scoffed.

"It's brilliant," Marianne said firmly.

"I understood half of what you said, man, but I think it works." Sean shrugged, nodding his head in approval.

"That's really good, Hank," Angel agreed.

"So, Magneto it is, then?" Darwin asked the group. "Then Charles, Marianne, Hank and Alex are the only ones without a name."

"We'll figure it out! We have to put in Charles' nerdiness into his name, somehow."

"I liked Angel's idea."

"Thank you, Sean."

"Good job with the name, Hank," Marianne said, patting his shoulder as she passed him by. "I'll be back in a moment, everyone."

As soon as she shut the doors firmly behind her, she fell against them with a heavy sigh. She shut her eyes and breathed in deeply.

She opened her eyes, stood up straight, and marched down the hallway. She had to stop an agent passing by to find out if the meeting was over or not. Luckily for her, it was, and the agent was nice enough to point her in the direction of the meeting room. After thanking him, she continued her walk, more determined now that she knew where she was going.

After walking down a few more hallways and turning a few more corners, she finally found the ones she had been looking for, and they were heading her way.

"Marianne, hello," Charles greeted brightly.

"Hello, Charles," she said. "Hello, Erik, Agent."

"Lucky we ran into you," Agent MacTaggert said, breaking her stride for a moment to allow Marianne to fall into step with her. "We just got Shaw's location and the go-ahead from my superiors."

"Charles, these kids are not ready for Shaw," Erik insisted.

The way he said "kids" struck Marianne, and she felt a surge of anger. They knew they were too young and they were still willing to use them? But he didn't think they should face Shaw either.

"About that," Marianne began, "I had some  _ questions  _ for the two of you-"

"I assure you, both of you," Charles interrupted, "that these young people are exceptional. They will surprise you."

"That is not what I was-"

"I know, Marianne, but I think-"

Agent MacTaggert cut them all off. "What the  _ hell _ ?"

Marianne had heard the sound of rock music in the distance but had thought nothing of it except to assume it was the kids having a good time. She had been right; she had been far too right. Rock music was blaring on the jukebox, at least five times louder than it needed to be. The couches had been shoved around the room, and a leg of the table in the back had gone missing. Angel was dancing several feet above the floor, a drink in one hand, while Raven bounced up and down on the couch, waving her hands in the air, both girls singing along to the music. Hank had somehow gotten up on the chandelier and was hanging upside down from his bare feet, shoes and socks discarded on the ground, his earlier nerves apparently gone. Darwin stood at the center of the room, covered in a protective layer of rock as Sean and Alex took turns hitting him with various items around the room while he yelled at them challengingly to do better.

Marianne glanced at the other adults. Agent MacTaggert had her hands on her hips, looking livid, Erik was staring in disbelief, and Charles just looked disappointed.

MacTaggert turned to look at the statue and squinted at it. "Does the statue look different to you?" She asked Marianne.

Marianne pursed her lips and didn't answer.

"It has a hole in its head," Erik supplied. "And it's smoking."

"Yes, I noticed that," MacTaggert snapped. "What happened?" She directed this question to Marianne.

"Things got... a little... out of hand," she said slowly, trying to figure out how to say it in English. "That's the right way to say it?" She looked to the others. Erik nodded while Charles continued to stare at the young adults who had yet to notice their presence. "I fixed it but I could only do so much." She decided not to mention the broken window.

MacTaggert closed her eyes, took a breath and headed for a door in the wall. The other three hurried to follow her as she yanked the door open, turned a corner, and pulled open the set of doors to the break room.

"What are you doing?" She yelled as soon as she had stepped inside, Marianne, Charles and Erik right behind her. The singing and shouting stopped; Hank dropped from the ceiling and rose to his feet, the boys stopped beating each other up, Angel floated back to the ground, her wings still spread out, and Raven stopped dancing. The music continued to play, but a glance at the jukebox from Marianne and a gentle tug of her mind made it stop.

"Marianne said she  _ fixed  _ the statue," MacTaggert said angrily, her hands returning to her hips. "What happened that made it need  _ fixing _ ?"

"Alex," Hank blurted out. Alex shot him a glare.

"No!" Raven said, turning to the two boys. "We have to call him Havoc now. That's his codename." She turned back to face the four elders, pointing at Charles. "And we were thinking you could be Professor X," she pointed at Erik, "and you could be Magneto!"

"Exceptional," Erik remarked sarcastically before turning and walking away. MacTaggert followed him, sighing, leaving Charles and Marianne standing together. Marianne bit her lip as Raven's face fell.

"I expect more from you," Charles said coldly as he, too, walked away.

Marianne looked at the teens, who were all watching her, looking embarrassed. All she said before following Charles out of the room was, "I was gone for five minutes."

She was more disappointed in herself than she was with them, if she was being honest. She had allowed them to mess around the way that they had, even if she hadn't encouraged it. Of course, they would take it to the next level once she was gone. But they were young and surrounded by other people like them for the first time ever; of course, they would want to let loose. On the other hand, she had asked them to calm down and it hadn't taken them very long to cause the damage they had. She sighed.

It wasn't really her place to be disappointed in them, though.

"Charles," she said, grabbing his shoulder. "Charles, they didn't mean any harm."

"I know that," Charles said in a clipped voice. "That doesn't mean they didn't cause harm."

"No one was hurt," she said with a frown. "They were just excited."

"They represent something new; they're the face of all of this. They can't afford to be excited if this is what happens."

"Charles," Marianne said forcefully, forcing him to stop and finally face her, "they are young. They are young and they are with people who are like them for the first time  _ ever _ . You cannot expect them to be perfect."

Charles frowned. "I don't expect perfection."

"Even so, you expect too much from them." She crossed her arms. "They are young. Sean is only eighteen, Alex and Angel are all nineteen. Hank is twenty. They will make mistakes." She was silent for a moment.

"And," she continued, "what exactly  _ do  _ you expect from them?"

Charles frowned further. "I expect a certain level of maturity. They all have extraordinary gifts, they should be able to act like adults."

She opened her mouth, but he spoke before she could. "I know you think they're children-"

"I don't think they are children," she said, although a voice in the back of her mind said otherwise. "I think they are young enough that most of them cannot even vote  _ and you brought them into a war. _ "

Charles looked taken aback by the steel in her voice. "We-"

"Sean is eighteen," she interrupted. "Hank is twenty. Alex and Angel are nineteen. Darwin and Raven are the only ones who should be here, and I use 'should' very loosely. You and Erik both recruited a bunch of- of young people to fight in a war, to possibly give their  _ lives _ , and you  _ criticize  _ them for  _ acting their age. _ "

Charles bit his lip and wouldn't meet her eyes.

"Sean is still in college, did you know that?" She continued. "Of course you did. He only graduated last year. I don't know about the others." She breathed in deeply. "How could you and Erik do that? Ask them to fight? There must have been others our age."

"There weren't," Charles said, shaking his head. "Not many, not enough."

Marianne stared. What did that mean, 'not enough'?

"I've been working on a theory about mutants and mutations," Charles began to explain. "Well, it's more of a paper - a thesis, really, it's what got me my rank as a professor and- and that's not important right now," he said quickly, seeing the look on her face. "My theory is that while mutants have always been among humanity, they've always been very rare. But the beginning of the nuclear age was a catalyst for the evolutionary process, so there are more now than there were before." He sighed. "Unfortunately, that means that most of the mutants we could find are younger than I would have liked."

"You don't find a problem with this?" Marianne demanded, spreading her hands.

"I  _ do _ ," Charles insisted, reaching out and putting a comforting hand on her shoulder. "Believe me, if there was another option, I  _ would  _ have taken it. This was the only option."

Marianne closed her eyes and shook her head, trying to focus her thoughts. This was too much. This could not have been the only option. But if Charles had a machine that let him read the minds of everyone on earth - then maybe it had to be. But he could have been lying.

She opened her eyes and met his. His crystal blue eyes stared at her, wide and desperate, pleading with her to believe what he was telling her.

Her shoulders sagged. She pinched the bridge of her nose and sighed. "I believe you," she said finally. "Does Erik think the same?"

"Yes, he does," Charles said, removing his hand from her shoulder and smiling in relief. "He's more determined to find Shaw and defeat him than I am, but he has the same feelings you do. Besides," he added, "you saw what they could do. Their powers are very strong, and we're going to help them all get stronger. We can do this. You have to trust they can handle it."

Marianne wanted to shake her head, but she didn't. Knowing Charles had the same reservations she did may have made her feel better but nothing about this situation was good.

"Why did they agree to this?" She asked. "Was it to meet others like them? Were they really so eager to go to war?"

"It was mostly the first one," Charles admitted, putting one hand in his pocket. "They wanted to develop their powers, meet other mutants. Did any of them  _ want  _ to go to war? No, but they were willing to fight for their country." He smiled slightly. "There's something to be said for their dedication."

"So, none of them-"  _ Wanted to die. Were leaving something worse. _

"No," Charles said quickly, taking a step forward and putting his hand on her shoulder again. "No, none of them are death seekers or anything like that. Don't worry about that."

_ Too late, _ she thought grimly.

* * *

The departure of Erik, Charles and Agent MacTaggert had been awkward; not for Marianne but for everyone else. Erik merely nodded at the group, MacTaggert said goodbye but also made the younger ones promise not to do any more damage (glaring at them all sternly as they each promised), while Charles gave Raven a tight hug and said a sincere goodbye to them all. The young adults had all reacted as anyone would when they had been embarrassed and pretended the earlier incident had never happened at all, when it was clear it was all they were thinking about.

Marianne, thankfully free from any embarrassing feelings, was able to say goodbye easily. She shook hands with Erik and said goodbye, and while doing the same with MacTaggert, the other woman told her, "Just call me Moira," which made her beam and  _ Moira  _ smile back, albeit somewhat awkwardly.

"Take care of yourselves," Marianne had said as the three departed. " _ Au revoir. _ "

"Until we meet again," Charles had said with a wink and a smile. Marianne shook her head, and she heard Raven snort. Moira gave a wave, Erik didn't look back, and the three were gone just like that.

The rest of the evening passed normally, with Marianne going to bed earlier than the others. The next day she also woke up earlier than they did, which meant she had some quiet time in the break room.

Apparently, out of the entire CIA facilities, the break room and their own rooms were the only places that were suited for them. While they were technically allowed to go anywhere, they were heavily discouraged from doing so. It hadn't been said in words, but the looks she received from the guards and agents in the halls certainly implied it. It wasn't the normal looks she was used to receiving from men - while there were certainly the same looks from a few of them, these looks were more... hostile. It was like they were waiting for her to do something. If they weren't hostile, it was like they were looking at a circus freak.

So Marianne stayed in the break room, which had been cleaned up over the night. The table was fixed and everything was back in place.

Once again, there was nothing but junk food - what were they expected to eat, exactly? She would have to bring that up with Agent Platt.

The others came in slowly, with Raven showing up first, bright and chipper, and Alex and Sean tied for last. As the day progressed, it became clear that the energy from the previous night had disappeared. The reality of being stuck in one room seemed to have drained them all of any excitement.

Fights were picked, mostly by Alex and mostly whenever Hank stopped by from whatever he was working on in his lab. Marianne and Darwin were always quick to end anything before it escalated, Hank would leave, and Alex would go back to whatever he had been doing. At around noon, Raven got bored, sat next to Marianne on the couch, and started trying to come up with codenames for her.

("How about... um, Enchantress?"

"I like that, but no, thank you."

"The Librarian," Sean said, spreading his hands in the air.

"I'm not a librarian."

"The Book Keeper, then."

"That doesn't have anything to do with her powers!"

"So then how about...")

And on and on it went.

* * *

"So, a bookstore?" Raven asked with her eyebrows raised. "So you're a nerd just like Charles?"

Marianne rolled her eyes. "I suppose so."

"How long have you owned it?" Angel asked.

"Almost thirteen years," Marianne said with a proud smile. "I was still pregnant with Henry when it opened."

"And you're thirty-one?" When Marianne nodded, Angel whistled, impressed. "Nineteen years old and you owned your own store? Nice."

"Wait, so you were only nineteen when you had a child?" Hank questioned, looking surprised.

Marianne shifted in her seat. "Yes." Before anything else could be said, she turned to Angel. "So, Angel, what about you? When did your mutation develop?"

Angel grimaced but described the morning she woke up at fourteen years old to find herself in a cocoon and emerged with a pair of dragonfly wings that stuck to her back like tattoos and the ability to spit acid. It did not sound like a pleasant experience.

"What did your parents think?" Marianne asked. She could only imagine what it would be like to wake up and find your child going through something like that.

"I don't know." Although Angel shrugged, her shoulders seemed stiff. "It happened the day after my stepdad kicked me out of the house." She said it like she was pointing out the weather.

Marianne stared.

"That's awful," Raven said, sounding sympathetic. She hesitated and then said, "My parents abandoned me when I was around nine. I met Charles when I was ten."

Marianne stared.

"Lucky you met Charles," Angel said with a sad smile. "I was on my own for a while. I met some nice people and they took care of me, but it wasn't quite the same as a family. I still had to hide these." She gestured to her wings.

Marianne stared.

"How about you, Hank?" Raven asked, turning to the spectacled boy, who suddenly became more interested in polishing his glasses on his shirt than looking at Raven. Raven nodded and didn't ask again. "Marianne? You?"

Marianne stared. She blinked and cleared her throat. "I'm- I'm sorry, you said you were fourteen? And ten?"

Angel and Raven nodded.

"I see." She could hear her heartbeat in her ears. Fourteen and ten years old. Children. Children abandoned by their parents. Children left on the streets. Angel's stepfather hadn't even known about her mutation and he had thrown her out.  _ Anything  _ could have happened to her.  _ Anything  _ could have happened to either of them.

Marianne cleared her throat again and shook her head. "My parents... well, they knew. They didn't understand, but they knew about me. There was not much they could do, so they would just try to keep me calm."

Angel nodded with a bitter smile. "Lucky you."

Lucky her. Her parents had been good in  _ that  _ regard, at least. Better than they could have been.

"When was the first time you found out about your acid spit?" Sean asked, changing the subject.

Angel grinned, a real one this time. "Well, that one took a bit of time to figure out. See, I was fifteen..."

While Angel entertained them with the story of spitting at some catcaller on the street and burning a hole through his leg, Marianne looked around the room at all of them. Darwin and Alex were playing with a pinball machine against the wall. Everyone else was sitting around on the couches and chairs listening to Angel's story.

_ So young, _ Marianne thought, her stomach twisting.  _ To be thrown on the street like trash... _ she knew Sean hadn't experienced that, and she certainly hadn't. But what about Alex or Darwin? Or Hank? Hank didn't seem to have had a good experience, if his avoidance of the subject was anything to go by.

She watched as Sean tossed some peanuts into the air and tried to catch them in his mouth. Two of them bounced off his nose and onto the floor. Hank laughed at something Raven had said about Angel's story. Marianne clenched her teeth and clutched her glass, making sure not to shatter it or any of the others by accident. What sort of parent abandoned their child like that?

A tap on the window pulled her out of her head and the chatter of the others stopped. They all turned to look at the window. Two agents stood on the other side, grinning mockingly at the inhabitants of the room.

"I didn't know the circus was in town!" One of them taunted.

Marianne's eyes narrowed. The smile on Raven's face disappeared, and Sean, Angel and Hank all now looked very uncomfortable.

"Hey, come on, honey," the other agent said, smirking at Angel. "Give us a little show!" He flapped his hands around his head in a poor imitation of wings.

Angel glared at them.

"No? Come on, let's see the foot!"

Marianne placed her glass on the table and stood up, staring straight at the two men. They leered.

"Hey, sweetheart, how about you come on out and show us what  _ you  _ can do?"

Sean began to rise to his feet, his face screwed up in anger, but Marianne held out a hand to stop him. Without a word, she strode towards the window, not breaking eye contact with the agents, who's taunts grew louder as she came closer. She held up her hand. The window cracked with a shattering sound. The taunting stopped as the two men yelped. With a flick of her wrist, the curtain closed, hiding the men from their view. She heard one of them yell "Freak!", and then heard the satisfying sound of one of them tripping over the piece of sidewalk in the courtyard she had raised. She smirked and turned around, waving her hand over her shoulder and fixing the window. Moira didn't need to know about that.

"You'd think men in their position would have better manners," she said sarcastically as she sat back down.

Angel angrily set her glass on the table and glared at the window.

"They're just guys being stupid," Raven said, sounding just as upset as Angel looked.

Angel scoffed. "Guys being stupid I can handle. I've been dealing with that my whole life. But I'd rather have guys staring at me with my clothes off than the way these ones stare at me."

"At us," Raven said after a moment, looking down at her lap.

Marianne opened her mouth to say something, but whatever she would have said died in her throat. A chill ran down her spine. The hairs on the back of her neck stood up.

Something was wrong.

She did not know what, but something was wrong.

A muffled sound came from outside. Then came a  _ thump _ .

She wasn't the only one who had heard it; she heard Darwin asking what it was.

The sound and thump came again, and again, and again.

Marianne stood up and approached the window. Every instinct in her body was telling her something was wrong. She heard the others standing up and joining her at the window, and Darwin stood right next to her. He hit the button that opened the curtains.

The courtyard was empty.

Marianne looked up.

There was a silhouette up in the sky, right up against the moon. It looked like two people.

"What is that?" Darwin asked in an eerily calm tone.

One of the figures disappeared. The other plummeted to the ground.

_ It's Platt, _ Marianne realized distantly. An electric shock ran through her body and she threw out her hand to stop his fall -

She acted too late. Platt's body hit the ground with a sickening smack. Everyone jumped back and Raven screamed. Marianne stared at the body, broken and bleeding, her mouth open slightly. His neck was bent at an odd angle.

A body fell into the courtyard. Then another. Then another. Each hit the ground with the same smack and crunching sound as Platt's. One fell right through the glass ceiling that hung over the garden, his body becoming bloody and mangled as the glass tore through him. His body hung limply from the ceiling - like a doll, Marianne thought with a sense of detachment.

The others were yelling. Raven was screaming. Marianne just stood there, staring at the body.

She felt Sean grab her arm. "Mrs. O!"

She was back to herself in an instant. "All of you, away from the window!" She yelled, pushing Sean behind her and reaching out towards Angel. When Angel reached her, Marianne pulled her closer and then pushed her behind as well, not taking her eyes off the window.

Several agents swarmed into the courtyard, each of them carrying rifles. Their leader hit the window, yelling at them to get back and to not leave the room. They were under attack. Without any warning, a man appeared in the center of the courtyard in a poof of red smoke. Marianne's first thought was that the devil had come for them all. The man's skin was blood red and he had horns and a tail, and he smiled broadly as the agents turned their guns on him. When the agents started firing at the devil man, everyone started screaming.

Marianne and Darwin exchanged looks for a split-second. Then they acted.

"Everyone behind the couches,  _ now _ !" Marianne screamed, turning and herding the others behind the closest couch. Darwin raised his arms in a defensive stance at the front of the group, ready to shield them from any stray bullets. Once everyone else was hidden behind the couch, Marianne spun back to face the window and held her arms out, doing her best to shield them herself. She glanced at Darwin and took a step forward, standing just a bit ahead of him.

The devil man disappeared and reappeared next to an agent, grabbing him and turning his firing gun towards the window. The window shattered. Marianne threw her hand out and the glass flew back, aimed straight for the devil man like millions of miniscule daggers. When he disappeared again, she willed them to fall to the ground before they hit any of the agents.

A roar coming from behind them made them all turn. Right outside the other window, a tornado swirled across the field, right into the path of Cerebro.

All the while, there was a buzzing in Marianne's ears. Something more was happening somewhere else. She could feel it in her bones.

The sound of clashing metal brought their attention back to the courtyard. The devil man had brought out a pair of swords and was cutting down the remaining agents like they were made of paper.

"Stay here, my ass!" Darwin yelled. "Let's  _ go _ !" He gestured for them to follow him and took off towards the door. When they didn't follow quickly enough, Marianne started grabbing them by their arms and shoulders, pulling them to their feet and pushing them towards the door. She didn't follow until everyone was in front of her. They rushed down the hall, Marianne looking behind them every so often, but were stopped by the agents at the end of the hall. Despite Darwin's protests that they could help and the attempts to get past the agents, they were held back.

A  _ pop  _ went off in Marianne's ears.  _ "Everyone get down!" _

Only a second after she screamed it, an explosion went off at the end of the hall. The ground shook and the walls were bathed in the oranges and yellows of fire. As the agents started shooting down the hall, Darwin started pushing them back to the room they had come from, with Marianne leading the group this time. As soon as she was in the room she had her arms held out, looking around for any threats. The others slid into the room, Sean reaching her side in seconds. She patted his shoulder, assuring herself he was alright, before her eyes were drawn to the tornado still whirling around the facility grounds. It tore into Cerebro, breaking it down into pieces that were then sucked back into the winds.

In the courtyard, the devil was still taking down agents with the grace and skill that could only come from a trained killer. He used every advantage, leaving his opponents with none. When there was only one agent left standing and aiming a gun at his head, he twisted his tail around the neck of another agent, swaying the man in front of him as a human shield until the free agent shot at him and hit the other agent in the head. Raven buried her face in her hands and let out a loud sob. Marianne grabbed her shoulder and gave it a squeeze, then spun around just in time to break the window and outstretch her arms. The agent that would have been smashed through the glass, sent flying by the tornado, flew straight to her, nearly bowling her over. Sean and Alex rushed to help her put him down on the floor, and Hank quickly checked his vitals. The man was unconscious and bleeding from his temple, but he was alive. That was what mattered.

The sound of a body hitting the ground told Marianne that the only agent still in the courtyard was dead. Raven sobbed again, and Marianne got to her feet and wrapped one arm firmly around the girl's shoulders, holding her close.

As the devil man stepped into the room through the window, acting as though he had not just murdered dozens of people, the tornado had come to a stop and evaporated into the air, leaving only a well-dressed man who mirrored the actions of the devil man. Marianne released Raven's shoulders and stepped forward, looking between the two men.

"Who are you?" She demanded. "What do you want from us?"

"All in good time, my dear," the devil man said in a Russian accent, smiling pleasantly at her. Marianne bristled at the title.

Darwin reached out and took her arm, but instead of pulling her back, he stepped forward and joined her side. They were the ones with the best defensive powers. Protecting the others was up to them. Glowering at the two men, Marianne held her arm out, once again shielding those behind her.

Gunshots fired down the hall on the other side of the doors. Someone was coming. The hairs on the back of her neck stood straight up and her hands began to shake.  _ Someone  _ was coming, and whoever they were, _ they were not good. _

"Wait!" A man's voice called, right on the other side of the doors. "You want the mutants? They're right through that door. Just let us normal people go!"

What felt like a stone dropped into Marianne's stomach. She heard soft gasps and a curse ( _ Definitely Alex, _ she thought dimly) from behind her. They were being betrayed by the ones meant to defend them.

A white-hot fire burned in her chest, so fiercely that strands of her hair began to float around her face. All of that, all those deaths in  _ defence  _ of them, and the last man standing was going to give them up? He was going to let the young people behind her die? He was going to let his fellow agent's sacrifices be in vain?

The sound of a body dropping, which was becoming far too familiar to her, came from behind the doors. A sick feeling of what could have been called satisfaction tempered her rage, and her hair fell back down.

But now they had to face whoever was on the other side of the doors.

The doors opened. A man stepped through and shut the door behind him. He wore a nice suit, but a rather stupid-looking metal helmet ruined the look. If things had been less tense, Marianne might have laughed in his face.

"Where's the telepath?" The man asked.

Charles flashed through Marianne's mind. Charles. He and Erik and Moira had no idea what was happening. They were on the other side of the world.

The devil man shook his head. "Not here."

The man in the helmet frowned. "Too bad," he said, as though he was talking about some bad weather. "At least I don't have to wear this silly thing any longer." He removed his helmet, and Marianne had a thought that was definitely inappropriate:  _ At least he knows it looks awful. _

The man tucked the helmet under his arm and faced them. Marianne held her arm behind her and herded the others back, while Darwin once again took a defensive stance next to her.

"Good evening," the man said, smiling cheerfully at them. "My name is Sebastian Shaw. And I am not here to hurt you."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Charles' reasoning for the ages of the mutants comes from the scene where he's explaining mutants to the CIA people for the first time: "The advent of the nuclear age may have accelerated the mutation process. Individuals with extraordinary abilities may already be among us."
> 
> Angel's backstory comes from her backstory in the comics. I think Angel (the version of her in this movie, anyway) is the kind of person who like, doesn't necessarily like talking about her personal history, but won't shy away from talking about it either.
> 
> Sean mouthed 'Apologize' at Alex. Marianne being so attached to Sean and writing about it has made me feel very attached to Sean as well. I stan. He's a precious boy and deserved better than to die in-between movies. Angel did as well. Darwin deserved better than to die on-screen when his mutation is to adapt to survive. Honestly I don't think it's a stretch to say that they all deserved better.
> 
> Hope you liked this chapter! Don't be shy, leave a kudos and/or a comment, please.


	8. Choice

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which other options are given, and yet there is no other choice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> French Translations  
> Lèves tes yeux hors d'elle : Get your eyes off of her.  
> Lèves tes bras hors d'il : Get your hands off of him.  
> Anything in italics and underlined is spoken in French.

An act of selecting or making a decision when faced with two or more possibilities.

* * *

Sebastian Shaw was not the kind of man Marianne had been expecting him to be.

The lack of regard for human life that had been displayed by his underlings (as Marianne guessed them to be), of course, was exactly what she had been expecting of him. But from how Charles and Erik had described him as a person, she had pictured him in her mind as an older man. She had thought he would be an obviously aggressive man, perhaps muscled, someone who came off slightly unhinged; shorter, maybe, and broader. She had pictured him more like the men she would see in the pubs late at night or drinking on the street corners, the type of man who lashed out at the world and the people around them because they felt they had been dealt a raw deal.

The real Sebastian Shaw in front of her was worse.

He was handsome, she could admit that, tall and lean, with a good face and lush hair. He wore a nice suit, black with a wine-red shirt underneath. He was relaxed, completely at ease as he walked towards them with a charming smile, even as he casually ordered the devil-man (who he called Azazel) to kill an agent who had run into the courtyard. He had an air of superiority around him, like the men who would rarely come into her store who were always looking for the first edition of some pretentious book written by a famous author or a relatively unknown author he would look down at her for not knowing. He seemed like the kind of man who could do anything and get away with it and had been raised to know it.

There was a thrum of energy within him. She could feel it. She had to ball her hands into fists to keep her hands from shaking.

This man had power. Too much power.

He smiled and chuckled as the final agent collapsed outside (Marianne flinched when she heard the body drop - a good agent, one who hadn't offered them up as a sacrifice or fled when he could have, was gone) and he passed the ugly helmet off to the man who had come from the tornado. "Thank you, Riptide," he said politely to the man, who nodded in acknowledgement.

"My friends," he said, looking back to them, "there's a revolution coming."

As he came closer to them, Marianne clenched her fists tighter and stood up straighter. She raised her chin and glared into his eyes. He merely raised an eyebrow and kept smiling when he noticed her dark look.

"When mankind discovers us and what we can do, each of us will face a choice: to be enslaved, or _ rise up to rule _ ." His voice lowered to a whisper as he shared his enticing offer. A chill ran down Marianne's spine. The man had a voice like silk, but his words left her feeling grimy. She followed his eyes as he looked at each and every one of them, lingering for seconds longer than what would have been appropriate. "Choose freely, but know that if you are not with us, then, by definition, you are against us."

He was threatening them. Threatening all of them.  _ Non _ . She stepped forward slightly, even as something inside of her screamed to stay away from him. She realized too late it was not a wise move, as his gaze shot back to her. He smiled. She dug her nails into her palms and darkened her glare. Her nostrils flared as her heart raced and her breathing quickened. The lights hanging from the ceiling began swaying back and forth slightly, even though there was no breeze.

"You?" He asked, almost thoughtfully. "I can feel... potential in you."

"No," she said sharply. "Stay away from us. All of you.  _ Leave _ ."

He examined her, looking disappointed. "I see. So, you're rejecting me, and the chance to rule and protect your own kind, in favour of... what, exactly?"

" _ Humanity _ ."

"You'll fight for the people who hate and fear you?" He asked with a smirk. "I will love to see how that goes for you. My offer will, of course, remain open for you and anyone else who remains blinded by... weakness."

"It is not weakness," Marianne said, lifting her chin. "If you see it as such, then I know I have made the right choice."

Humanity didn't mean all of humankind, not to her. To her, it meant her family **.** Humanity was the people she loved and who loved her. It did not mean everyone. She had not come here for everyone.

She had come here for Henry. Her  _ human  _ son, the son of herself and her  _ human  _ husband.

She would not join Shaw.

Shaw put his finger to his lips, not to silence her but like he was judging her, examining her once again.

"You," he said, lowering his finger, his hands returning to his sides as he looked down at her with a soft smirk, "are making a very poor decision, and that is a shame. A waste of potential. As for the rest of you," to her alarm, he returned to looking at the others, still with the same smirk, "those of you who do not want to fight for those who, again, hate and fear you, are welcome to join me, and live like kings... and  _ queens _ ."

His eyes dropped to Angel, who was visible over Marianne's shoulder. He held out his hand. Marianne stepped slightly to the right, blocking Angel from his view. _Lèves tes yeux hors d'elle._

Then Angel slowly walked around her and placed her hand into Shaw's outstretched one.

Marianne stared as Shaw closed his hand around Angel's and led her to the window, where Azazel and Riptide stood, waiting.

" _ Angel? _ "

"Are you kidding me?"

Angel stopped and turned back to them. She didn't look cold or cruel as Shaw and his lackeys looked. She looked resolved, and yet... tired. She gestured with her head for them to follow her. "Come on," she said, in a voice that sounded moments from breaking. "We don't belong here. That's  _ nothing  _ to be ashamed of."

Marianne's heart clenched.

As much as she instinctively hated Shaw, for everything he stood for, as much as she knew Angel's choice was an act of betrayal against them and everything they were supposed to stand for, she could not hate Angel. Not when Angel had told her of her parent's abandonment, had looked so angry at the mockery of the two human agents, had told them all of the struggles of being herself. Not when they had all heard the final human standing between them and Shaw give them up, so the "normal people" could go free. Not when Angel was looking at them like that, so  _ tired _ .

"Angel,  _ do not  _ do this," she pleaded, taking a step forward. " _ Please _ . It does not have to be this way."

Beside her, Darwin reached his hand out. For a moment, Angel stared at them and it felt like she might let go of Shaw's hand and take Darwin's.

The moment passed. Angel's expression grew resolved and stony when she realized they were not coming with her, and she turned and walked away with Shaw.

Marianne closed her eyes and looked down.

Angel had made her choice. It was a choice Marianne did not agree with, and a choice that hurt her even if she understood why Angel had made it.

She did not understand how Angel could so willingly go with the men who had just murdered an entire building full of people, but she could understand the choice she had made.

"We have to do something," Raven said.

"To stop Angel, or to stop Shaw?" Marianne questioned.

"Either. Both. We have to do  _ something _ ."

"I have an idea," Darwin whispered. Marianne opened her eyes. He turned around. "Alex. Push me."

Alex looked from Darwin to Shaw in the background, and then back to Darwin. Darwin put a hand on his shoulder. "I protect Angel, you get Shaw. Got it?" He whispered. Alex glared at him and shoved Darwin away from him. Darwin flashed him the quickest smile.

"Darwin, no." Marianne grabbed his arm. "You  _ can't _ ."

Darwin yanked his arm out of her grip, giving her a quick wink and another smile. The smile fell as he turned around. "Stop." He went after Shaw and the others. "I'm coming with you."

Marianne stared as Shaw approached Darwin, giving another charming smile. She felt Alex lean over to her. "Nice acting," he whispered.

"What acting?" She whispered back, her eyes trained on Shaw and Darwin. This could go wrong in so many ways. Logically she knew Darwin's mutation should protect him. But things could go wrong, and if they  _ did- _

She stood in her spot even as Alex approached the middle of the room, the others slowly followed behind. In the courtyard, Shaw gestured for Darwin to join their line. She did take a small step back, standing closer to the wall just in case. She squared her shoulders and clenched her fists tighter as Shaw patted Darwin on the back.  _ Lèves tes bras hors d'il. _

Darwin stood next to Angel. "Alex!"

"Get down!" Alex yelled. Everyone ran for cover. Marianne shoved her back against the wall, not taking her eyes off of the scene before her. Darwin pulled Angel into his arms and turned his back on Shaw, covering himself in a layer of rock. The scarlet rings of energy swirled around Alex's body and went flying towards Shaw. Just like before, they went flying all over the courtyard, but one managed to go in Shaw's direction.

Shaw just simply took a few steps forward, raised his arms above his head, and grabbed the energy with his bare hands. The ring grew smaller and smaller and Shaw's skin shimmered and glowed with red - he was absorbing the energy. Something happened to his body as he did. He went blurry - or he had two heads - or his hands grew in size - Marianne didn't know, it happened too fast. Her stomach dropped.

The energy she had felt. It was within him. He absorbed energy. Her mind raced. She tried to remember what she had learned about energy from her high school lessons-

Alex stood in the middle of the room, his hand outstretched, his triumphant grin vanishing as he watched Shaw absorb his energy.

"Protecting your fellow mutants?" Shaw asked. Marianne grit her teeth at the amusement in his voice. "That's a noble gesture. Feels good."

Azazel yanked Angel out of Darwin's arms. Darwin lunged at Shaw just as the man turned around, aiming a punch straight for his face - but Shaw blocked it, and the same warping happened to his body once again.

_ Lèves tes bras hors d'il- _

Shaw grabbed Darwin's jaw, forcing him to open his mouth.

Her eyes grew wide.

He raised the glowing ball of Alex's energy to Darwin's open mouth.

_ No, no, stop this, no- _

_ "Adapt to-" _

The end of Sebastian Shaw's sentence was lost as a giant fish tank crashed into him, the glass shattering into millions of pieces over his head, the water drenching him and his finely pressed suit from head to toe, the fish landing on the ground where they began to flop around his feet. Shaw's reaction - a dropped open mouth - seemed to be more because of the water, rather than the tank breaking over his head. Everyone slowly turned to look at the person who had attacked.

Marianne stood in front of Alex, her right arm outstretched, her hair slowly floating around her face as though untethered by gravity. Her dark blue eyes almost seemed darker as she stared at Shaw with a chillingly cold expression, a contrast to the fury blazing in her eyes.

Shaw stared at her, somehow managing to still look haughty even as his suit (now surely ruined) dripped puddles onto the pavement and fish flopped around his feet or, for one unlucky fish, inside his jacket pocket. His loss of concentration allowed Darwin to yank himself free and run back into the room. He stood in front of the other mutants, who stood watching Marianne in shock.

Darwin was out of Shaw's grasp. Marianne lashed out once more. The jukebox flew from the wall and smashed into Shaw. Shaw did not lose his footing and the jukebox smashed into pieces as it hit his body. Marianne pivoted on her foot, throwing her left arm forward and her right arm back. The couch went flying, brushing past Marianne so closely she felt it graze her shoulder, out the window and into Shaw. Shaw caught the couch - she heard him laughing in delight, the  _ monster  _ \- and flung it back at her, only slightly faster than when she had thrown it at him. She reached forward and threw her arms out to the side and the couch split in half, the pieces flying past her on either side.

Shaw stared at her. Then he laughed. She pressed her lips into a thin line.

"Alright, I can see I'm not wanted," he said, raising his hands in what she assumed was supposed to be a peaceful gesture. "We're leaving."

Behind him, his lackeys - and Angel - stood into a line, holding each other's hands. Shaw joined them at the end of the line, still watching her and smiling. Without saying a word, he lifted his hand.

The glowing ball of Alex's energy swirled between his fingers.

Marianne reached behind her, grabbed Alex's shoulder and placed her other hand on his back, and pushed him towards the others, following right behind him. Darwin grabbed Alex and herded him and Marianne back with the others. Marianne stood behind Darwin.

In a puff of red smoke, the group disappeared, but right before they did, Shaw opened his hand and released Alex's energy.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Darwin lives because He Deserves It.
> 
> I don't know about the rest of you, but I always understood Angel's point of view. Her perspective, I think, is kind of the same as Raven's is at the end of the movie: "My mutation is way more obvious than anyone else's. I'm always going to be an outcast, people hate or fear me because I'm an outcast, so why shouldn't we fight to defend ourselves before they can hurt us?"
> 
> Plus, they literally just faced two agents making fun of them and heard another agent selling them out so he could live. I think her bitterness is justified.
> 
> I'm assuming, of course, Angel doesn't know about Shaw's history of being a fucking Nazi.
> 
> Hope you liked this chapter! Don't be shy, leave a kudos and/or a comment, please.


	9. Strong

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The aftermath of Shaw's attack.

Not easily upset, resistant to harmful or unpleasant influences; physically powerful, capable of exerting great physical force.

* * *

In a puff of red smoke, the group disappeared, but right before they did, Shaw opened his hand and released Alex's energy.

Darwin turned and shielded them.

Marianne threw her hands up.

The explosion washed over them in a blaze of red light and fire and heat - Marianne watched it come closer, closer, closer, and she pushed  _ back _ .

The fire parted around them like Moses and the Red Sea, swirling to the side and above them, washing over everything else like a tidal wave but never touching or even coming close to them. She pushed harder, forcing the energy away from them, around them, anywhere else but near them.

The explosion did not last long. It was just seconds of fire and heat and light and pushing  _ back _ , pushing  _ away, _ and then it ended, leaving them surrounded by clouds of smoke and what remained of the facility. Marianne didn't lower her hands. It turned out to be the good thing to do, as a piece of the ceiling above fell and would have crushed them had it not been for her. She heard Raven squeak and Sean yelp as the debris was deflected and fell to the ground next to them.

Then it was silent. No one dared to speak.

Marianne waited a few moments longer, waiting for the smoke to clear. When it had mostly been cleared out, she finally lowered her hands and let her defences drop.

She looked around. The part of the building they had been in and everything close had been destroyed, leaving only some half-obliterated structures and piles of slightly-smoking rubble. Half of the facility was still standing, giving them enough light in the darkness to see the destruction and all of the corpses that still covered the grounds - those that hadn't been burned to a crisp by the explosions, at least.

Hank was the first one to break the silence. "Oh my  _ God _ ."

Marianne could not have said it better herself.

Finally, she cleared her throat and softly said, "Is everyone alright?"

Raven made a soft, pained noise, but when Marianne turned to check on her, she was nodding her head, tears running down her cheeks. Hank, although unhealthily pale, nodded as well. Alex was staring blankly across the devastation but seemed physically unharmed. Sean looked like he was going to be sick.

"Sean?"

He nodded, his voice raspy as he said, "I'm fine."

Marianne turned to Darwin, who had been standing completely still and had not made a sound. "Darwin."

He blinked after a moment and looked down at her.

"Are you alright?" She asked, reaching up and placing a hand on his shoulder. He tensed under her touch for a moment but relaxed just as quickly.

"I'm good," he said. "Thanks to you. That was- thank you."

She nodded. "No thanks needed."

"Do you think you could have survived that?" Alex said suddenly. When Marianne looked at him, his eyes were haunted as he stared at Darwin. "If she hadn't saved you."

There was a long pause as Darwin stared back at Alex.

"I don't know."

"But your mutation-" Hank began, cutting himself off in confusion before starting over. "Shouldn't it have protected you?"

"Yeah, but somehow I just know? That it wouldn't have worked. For some reason," Darwin said, sounding distant. "Maybe it would have."

Alex clenched his jaw. "So I could have killed you."

" _ Shaw _ could have killed Darwin," Raven corrected, her voice cracking. "It isn't your fault, Alex."

"Raven is right. We did not know what he could do."

"I could have killed Darwin."

"Man, you didn't know-"

_ "I could have killed you. _ "

"Now is not the time to think about _ what-could-have-been, _ " Marianne interrupted, thanking God that her voice didn't crack. "We were just attacked by Shaw. Angel is gone."  _ Oh, Angel. _ "We need to call someone. The fire department, the- um, the  _ paramédical  _ \- paramedics, for any survivors. See if we can contact Moira." She resisted the urge to play with her locket, keeping one hand on Darwin's shoulder and the other at her side, flat against her leg. "There has to be a phone still working somewhere, we need to find it. They must have something for emergencies. We should split up - some of us can search for survivors, others can try to find a way to contact somebody." She took a deep breath, trying to focus. "I will search for survivors or anything that can be saved, and Darwin, you and Raven and Sean can go find a phone or something. Hank, do you have any, um... medical training?"

"I have enough."

"Then you can stay with me, if you want. Alex, what do you want to do?"

Alex, his arms crossed and shoulders practically at his ears, muttered something about staying and helping but said it so quietly Marianne barely heard him. She nodded. "Alright." She rubbed Darwin's shoulder. "Is that alright with everyone?"

They all nodded or mumbled something in agreement. Darwin took a second too long to do the same. Marianne turned to Darwin and wrapped her arms around him in a tight hug.

It was an act done on an impulse, something she had done so many times for Henry and for her siblings, growing up. Darwin had nearly died. He needed it.

He was a few inches taller than her, so she was not able to tuck his head under her chin as she did for Henry or her siblings, but she was still able to hook her chin over his shoulder, which was good enough. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, rubbing the area between his shoulder blades with one hand and cupping the back of his neck with the other. He stiffened at first, but after a moment, he relaxed. He even leaned into it, hugging her back, leaning his head against hers gently. She felt him sigh, felt him tremble and felt his hug tighten.

When Darwin pulled back, she did the same but kept her hands on his shoulders and took a moment to look him in the eyes. When he gave her a small smile, one that reached his eyes, she was able to return it. Marianne removed her hands from him and then approached Sean, sweeping him into her arms in a similar embrace. He hugged her back just as tightly as she hugged him, his fingers grasping at the back of her shirt like he was trying to grab a lifeline. Her fingers carded through his hair, pushing it every direction and then smoothing it back into place. 

"We're okay," she said, willing her voice to be strong.  _ "We're okay." _

Sean squeezed her even tighter for a few seconds and then released her. He stepped back and met her eyes. "Yeah," he said firmly. "I know."

Marianne smiled, reached up and gently pushed a lock of his hair back into place. She turned to Raven, who stood hovering nearby with an unsure expression. The tear-tracks on her face were still visible. Marianne took a moment to place her hand on the younger woman's shoulder. Raven chewed her lip.

"I'm okay," Raven said. Marianne nodded.

"If anything happens, come and let us know," Marianne said to the group. They nodded and the three of them walked off, carefully maneuvering through the rubble surrounding them. Marianne turned and saw that Alex had already started working, picking up whatever he could. "Alex, don't strain yourself."

Alex didn't respond and kept working.

Hank was kneeling on the floor of what had been the lounge. Marianne approached him and was surprised to see the unconscious man she had saved earlier, unharmed, a ring of undestroyed concrete flooring around him.

"He's still alive," Hank said, checking his neck and wrist for a pulse. "He's untouched by the explosion, just like us. Did you shield him, too?"

"Yes, although it wasn't my focus," Marianne admitted, crouching down next to Hank. "I was thinking more about the rest of us."

"But you still managed to shield him, even though you weren't focusing on him," Hank concluded. "That's incredible."

"I was thinking of him," Marianne corrected. "Enough that I was able to protect him. But I was thinking mostly about us." She stared at the man. "Hank."

"Yes?"

"Are you alright? What just happened - it was not something we were expecting." She swallowed but made sure to keep her features unbothered. "How are you feeling?"

Hank stared at the man. "I'm fine," he said after a moment. He was silent for a moment longer. "Ask me later."

"Alright." She stood up. "If you need anything, you can talk to me. Alex!" She called to the boy. He turned and she was grateful he acknowledged her. "Have you found anything?"

"If I had, I would have said something!" He snapped.

Marianne did not respond to him. She turned to face the destruction. She began sifting through the rubble, slowly, to ensure nothing would happen if things moved too quickly. Chunks of concrete slowly rose into the air, followed by glass and pipes dripping water and other pieces of the facility. Nothing.

She continued with this process, walking through the grounds and going through the remains. She found several bodies. She found what remained of bodies. She found no survivors.

The third time she was confronted with a corpse mutilated beyond recognition, she had to turn away, holding her hand to her mouth and blinking back tears, trying not to vomit. Memories of a blood-stained body covered in a white sheet surfaced in her mind, unwanted and unbidden. She squeezed her eyes shut and took a few deep breaths. She had to remain calm. She could break down later, out of sight. She needed to stay calm for now.

She inhaled, held it, and exhaled. She opened her eyes and checked to see if anyone had seen her. She turned around, looked at the body, and, hands shaking only slightly at her sides, willed the body to float up and across the ground to the field where she had started placing all of the corpses and discovered remains.

She took a few steps further and felt glass break under her shoe. She looked down.

She realized that this must have been where her room had been. Underneath her foot was the photo of Lawrence and Henry she had put up. The wooden frame was charcoal black and splintering. The glass was broken. The part of the photo with Lawrence had been completely burned away, the edges of where he had once been curling and still smoking. Henry had been untouched.

Marianne knelt and picked the pieces of glass away, ignoring when a sharp piece cut her finger. She moved the frame - it left a residue of black on her fingers - and picked the photograph up.

It was a mistake to do so. The photo came apart, becoming ashes the second it was in her hand. Henry's face had been smiling up at her and the next minute, he was gone without a trace.

She stared at her fingers, at the few flakes of ash that was left of her family, and did not move for what felt like a very long time.

* * *

The others had managed to get in touch with the facility's emergency contacts, as well as the fire department and the paramedics. They had managed to contact Moira as well, and Moira had promised they were on their way back to the States and would be there in only a few hours.

There was nothing more they could do after the first responders arrived. They recognized that, due to where the attack had taken place, whatever had happened was classified information and so beyond asking a few necessary questions (if anyone was hurt, if there were any other survivors), the mutants were mostly left alone. Other government agents arrived and took over the situation, answering all questions and making plans on what to do next. They ignored the mutants entirely, which they were all grateful for. Marianne did not want to be questioned by strangers in suits.

The six of them sat down on the cement bench in front of the facility and waited for Moira, Charles, and Erik to return.

Hours went by without anyone checking on them. It was after midnight by the time the first responders arrived, but no one slept or even dozed off despite their clear exhaustion. Sean came the closest after putting his head on Marianne's shoulder, but he refused to fall asleep. There was some attempt at conversation, but they all quickly lapsed back into silence.

Marianne asked everyone how they were doing every so often, despite no change in their situation. Every time, no one said anything more positive than "fine." Alex and Darwin never answered at all.

Darwin had made a point to sit next to Alex. Alex had said nothing to acknowledge it, but Marianne watched them bump shoulders and thought he had appreciated it.

Marianne had, at some point during their wait, placed a hand on Alex's shoulder. He had gone stiff when she touched him, but when she started to pull back he had relaxed just a bit, and he hadn't told her not to touch him, so she kept her hand where it was. She wondered how long he had gone without affection before Charles and Erik had found him.

It was seven in the morning when Charles, Erik, and Moira finally arrived, pulling up in the same car Marianne and Sean had arrived in. Charles jumped out of the car before it had come to a complete stop, Erik only seconds behind him. Charles ran through the wreckage and went straight to Raven, who had stood to tightly hug her brother. Charles hugged her back just as tightly, letting out an audible sigh of relief as soon as she was in his arms. Marianne couldn't help but give a tired smile at the display of love.

"Thank God you're alright," Charles said, wrapping an arm around Raven's shoulder once they had stopped hugging. "Is everyone-?"

"Everyone is safe, Charles," Marianne said.

"Good." Charles nodded. "We're making arrangements for all of you to be taken home immediately."

"We're not going home," Alex stated.

"What?"

"He's not going back to prison," Sean said firmly. Alex had told them the circumstances in which Charles and Erik had found him some time during the day - he had offhandedly mentioned it and after a few questions (mostly from Marianne), no one had brought it up since.

"Shaw almost killed me," Darwin said.

"All the more reason for you to leave," Charles said. "If he almost killed Darwin, he could kill the rest of you. This is over."

"I'm not going home." Darwin rose to his feet. "I could have died. I can't just go home after that."

"Then we won't go home," Erik said. Everyone turned to look at him. "We'll stay and fight."

The look on Charles's face spoke volumes. He pulled Erik aside for a quick conversation.

Marianne stood up. She crossed her arms and looked around at them all. Sean, hunched over in his seat but with a determined look in his eyes she hadn't seen before; Alex, arms crossed and full of defiance; Hank, hands shaking but jaw set; Darwin, standing tall and unafraid; and Raven, looking small and fragile but holding clenched fists at her sides.

She wondered how she looked to them, and could only hope she looked strong.

"We'll have to train," Charles said; Marianne turned around. "All of us."

"We can't stay here, though," Hank reminded them. "Even if they reopen the department, it wouldn't be safe for us to be here. Where do we go?"

Charles smiled slowly. "I think I know a place."

Raven's eyes widened. "Charles, you're not thinking-"

"Yes, I am."

"We haven't been there in years, would it even be functional?"

"There's been a cleaning service coming in every four months or so to make sure it's usable in an emergency, or if we ever decided to come back." Charles put his hands in his pockets. "We may as well take advantage of that."

"What is it?" Marianne questioned.

"Our childhood home," Charles said, rejoining Raven's side and putting an arm around her shoulders. "It's been empty since our parents died, we both moved away when I left for school. It's secluded, so one will bother us or know we're there - it's the last place anyone would look for us. And it's big enough for all of us."

"Sounds good to me." Sean stood up. "Well, it's not like we have anything to pack up anymore. Let's get going."

"What are we doing?" Moira, who had been discussing things with whoever was in charge of the agents and soldiers swarming the grounds, finally joined the group. While Charles quickly explained things to her, Erik put a hand on Marianne's back. She looked up at him; he looked down at her.

"Can I speak with you?" He made a gesture for her to follow him, which she did. They only went a short distance away from the others, not far enough for them to not hear anything but far enough that they couldn't overhear without effort.

"Are you staying with us?"

"What?" Whatever she had been expecting, it had not been that.

"You don't have to do this," Erik said. "You can leave if you want. Go home. Be with your son." There was urgency in his voice that had not been there before, though his expression had not changed.

Marianne studied him.

"Why are you giving me permission to leave?" She asked. It was not that she did not appreciate his understanding of her situation - it was just that she did not understand him.

Erik stared at her, his eyes searching her face. Finally, he said, "You have a son."

She tilted her head.

"A boy shouldn't be without his mother."

There was sorrow and grief in his voice, mirrored in his eyes. From the look on his face, he had not meant for it to escape. He closed his eyes and took a deep breath.

Marianne reached out and put her hand over his arm, giving him what she hoped was a comforting squeeze.

She may not have understood him, but she could tell that the world had not been kind to him.

When he opened his eyes, she said, "I have to stay."

When he said nothing, she looked over the grounds. "I know originally I did not want to come because I did not want to risk my life fighting Shaw and leave Henry an orphan," she said. "But now I have seen what he can do."

Marianne looked back up at Erik. "I cannot leave. I have to stay and ensure that Shaw does not win this war."

She could not leave and hope they would win without her. She could not risk that. She could not stay home and listen to the news, waiting for the best or the worst.

She still did not want to die. She could not leave Henry an orphan. But the image of the burning photograph was seared in her mind.

"I have to fight for Henry," she said softly.

She glanced at Sean, at Alex and Raven and Henry and Darwin.

She had to fight for everyone.

Erik gave her a slow, sad smile. He put his hand over the one she still had over his arm and gave her a gentle pat.

"You mothers," he said in a voice she thought was rather fond. "I've never met anyone stronger."

Marianne smiled up at him. "I don't doubt it."

When they turned back to rejoin the group, they found Charles standing there waiting for them. He studied Marianne with a confused frown.

"Have we been approved?" Marianne asked with a light voice. "Are we off to your childhood home?"

Charles, apparently shaking off whatever had been in his mind, smiled and nodded. "We have; we're off to Westchester right now."

"Westchester?" Marianne repeated, dread forming in the pit of her stomach. "So - we're taking the plane again?"

"I think so," Erik teased, lightly patting her on the shoulder. "We can't let Darwin drive us again."

Marianne made a displeased noise that made both men laugh; they rejoined the young adults, as well as Moira, who was coming with them ("I started this, and you need  _ someone  _ to watch over you, I'm not  _ leaving, _ "), and headed off to find a car that would fit all of them, or a second car so they could go in two groups.

"So, you're not leaving?" Charles asked in what Marianne assumed was supposed to be a casual voice but was failing miserably at being so.

"No," she said firmly. "As I told Erik, and I assume you overheard, I have to fight for Henry's future."

Charles nodded, though he had begun to frown slightly once more. "That's very noble of you."

"I think it is something any - any  _ good  _ mother would do," Marianne said. She had almost said 'any mother' but had managed to stop herself before she could.

Charles nodded again, this time smiling grimly. "I don't doubt it."

Marianne shot him a worried look he didn't notice. Suspicion was forming in her mind but she wouldn't develop any theories just yet.

They managed to find a second car, and the team - they were a team now, Marianne thought with amusement, just like the superheroes in Sean's comic books - split into two groups. Marianne ended up in the group with Erik, Moira, Darwin, and Hank. While Moira drove and Erik took the passenger seat, Marianne sat in the back by the window with the two boys.

She stared out the window at the passing countryside. The colours of the sunrise hadn't yet faded. There were still streaks of vibrant reds, oranges, and golds.

If she thought too hard, the red in the sky looked like blood smeared across the pavement. If she closed her eyes, the reds, oranges and golds turned to flames in her mind, burning her photograph to ash.

She closed her eyes, forcing back the stinging tears, and leaned her head against the window. She had to remain calm. She could break down later, out of sight. She needed to stay calm for now.  ****

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The alternate chapter title is "Everyone Has Issues Pt. 1/?"
> 
> Hope you liked this chapter! Don't be shy, leave a kudos and/or a comment, please.


	10. Begin

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charles's childhood home explains a lot. Marianne finds herself softening up to him.

To go into the first part of a process, to come into existence, to have a starting point.

* * *

It was ridiculous that Marianne could still be afraid of flying after what she had just faced, but it was true. This time, though, she kept her hands off the seat to keep herself from gripping the armrests again and exposing her terror. She focused on looking out the window, watching the country pass below them, and listening to the others talk around her.

When Raven told Charles, Erik, and Moira how Marianne had attacked Shaw, Erik actually laughed out loud, startling everyone. He laughed so hard he ended up having to cover his mouth with his hand to stifle himself, but everyone could see him smiling behind his hand. His shoulders shook with silent laughter for ages afterward. Marianne ended up smiling herself out of pride.

Marianne made sure to tell everyone how Darwin had protected them all, always stepping in to shield them and being the first to lead them to safety when the guns started firing. When Darwin tried to shrug it off, the others swooped in to start praising him. Darwin grinned at the praise, ducking his head bashfully when Moira commended him for his actions. Charles and Erik (who was still clearly trying not to laugh) also expressed their pride in him, and some of the stress still left in Darwin fell away as they did.

* * *

The childhood home Charles had described was nothing like Marianne had pictured. It was not a home, it was a mansion - it was practically a castle. The grounds, all belonging to Charles and his family, stretched on for miles. The only sign that they were anywhere near other people was the gigantic satellite dish in the distance.

Marianne couldn't even imagine growing up in a house like this. It was as though she had stepped into the world of her books.

" _ This _ is  _ yours? _ "

The group stood in the driveway, the rental car a few feet behind them, staring up at the mansion with varying degrees of surprise. None of them had expected anything like this. Even Marianne, who had assumed Charles had led a privileged life -  _ a private plane _ , for God's sake - was taken aback.

"It's ours now," Charles corrected Sean.

"Honestly, Charles, I don't know how you survived, growing up in such hardship," Erik quipped, raising an eyebrow.

Marianne smirked at the remark but stopped. For just a second, right after Erik had said it and right before Raven had stepped forward and joined Charles' side, Charles had looked uncomfortable. She wasn't sure why.

"Time for the tour," Raven said, looping her arm through Charles' and leading them all inside.

The mansion was just as impressive on the inside as it had been on the outside, if not more so. It was obvious that Charles came from a very wealthy family. Everything was probably worth more money than Marianne had ever had in her life. Her entire store could have fit in the foyer. The staircase alone was something out of a romance novel. Plush carpeting in deep blues covered the floors, crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling, huge windows along the stairwell allowed light to stream in, pieces of beautiful artwork hung on the walls - there was even a suit of armour in the hallway.

Charles explained that the castle had been built by his grandfather, and improved by his step-father in Charles' childhood. Many of the objects in the building were antiques passed down through his family for years. Beyond that, he remained mostly quiet, with Raven being their primary guide, and only spoke up when Raven forgot something or got something wrong. He even drifted towards the center of the group, then further back to where Moira, Erik and Marianne had been following the younger adults.

"Alright, Charles?" Marianne asked him quietly. They had just passed his parents' bedroom. Raven hadn't had much to say about it other than that, and Charles had stiffened slightly when it had been mentioned.

"Hmm?" He blinked and then realized what she had asked him. "Oh. Yes, I'm fine. Just," he shrugged, "it's strange being back here after so many years."

"When did you move out?" Moira asked.

"A while before I started university. I wanted to spend some time in England before starting school, get used to living there. Get away from home. Get Raven somewhere else." He smiled at his sister, leading the group and speaking rapidly and enthusiastically.

"Why did you bring her with you?" Erik questioned. "Did she want to come, or...?"

"She wanted to come, yes, but mostly I-" Charles' smile faded. "I couldn't leave her on her own."

"Couldn't?" Moira repeated, frowning. "What do you mean by couldn't?"

Marianne had noticed that word as well - not "wouldn't", but "couldn't." He  _ couldn't  _ leave Raven.

Charles shrugged. "I just mean that - well, we've always been together, and I've always taken care of her, it's not like I could leave her here with- Raven, that's actually Elizabethan-style, not Victorian."

"Whatever!"

Charles huffed but smiled, and didn't continue what he had been saying. Looks were exchanged by the other three, out of Charles' line of sight, but no one brought it up again.

Raven led them by a study, and suddenly Charles lit up and grabbed Marianne's hand. She abruptly stopped, turning to face him with a quizzical look. "Charles?"

"Go on without us," he told Erik and Moira, who had stopped as well. "There's one room Raven forgot to mention, back this way." He pointed down the hall they had just come from. "I think you'll like it."

Marianne nodded slowly and followed him as he led her back down the hall. "What room is it?" She raised an eyebrow. "It's not your bedroom, is it?"

"Would you like it to be?" Charles asked with a cheeky grin.

"Only because I would get to give you a slap if it were," she responded with a smirk.

"Ah, we don't want that, do we?" Charles had them take a right down a different hallway they had skipped before. Marianne looked out the passing windows, staring out across the grounds. "Impressive, isn't it?"

"It's incredible," she said honestly. "I've only seen places like this in books. I cannot quite believe it is  _ real _ ."

"You've seen people control metal and read minds and shoot energy out of their bodies, and my family's estate is what you can't believe?" Charles teased her.

"It would be more incredible if I did not have powers," she defended herself. "Since I do, I do not find the existence of other mutants to be unbelievable. But places like this," she gestured to their surroundings, "I never dreamed I would see for myself, never dared imagine I would  _ live _ in one."

"Yes, well, there are benefits to living in places like these," Charles said as they came to the end of the hallway, where a pair of doors with ornate carving stood closed. He put his hands on both handles and opened them up. "Like having rooms like  _ this _ ."

Marianne swore she felt her heart stop.

_ Books.  _ A library - for what else could it be called - full of tall shelves, all filled with rows and rows of books, with cracked spines and faded colours and filling the room with that wonderful old book smell. Most of the books were old and worn, clearly read many times, but had been taken care of, while others had uncracked spines and didn't look like they had ever been moved off the shelf. There were books thin as a sheet of paper, others were doorstoppers; some were older, some seemed relatively new; there was a variety of genres, it seemed, for she could spot titles that were more scientific in nature in one section and titles of plays and poetry in another.

Marianne's hands rose to cover her mouth as she let out an audible gasp.

There were so many - and all in one room. And this wasn't even the end of them, since she had managed to glance inside the study before Charles pulled her away and saw that room filled with books as well.

She ran - nearly flying off the ground - to the nearest shelf and inspected the titles. All history books focused on England. She looked at the next shelf and saw it filled with history books focused on France. She gingerly ran her fingers over the title of one about France in the First World War, then ran across the room, hair streaming behind her, to a different shelf, entirely dedicated to Shakespeare's works.

Marianne laughed out loud, smiling so wide her face almost hurt. This was better than the mansion.  _ This  _ was what she had dreamed of, a room full of more books than she had ever seen in one place.

"Can I assume you like it?" She heard Charles ask, and she remembered that he was here, too. She turned to him.

"This is incredible," she said, sounding as breathless as she felt. "I don't know if I've ever seen so many books in one place - our local library is small, it's alright, but it is not- and my store, I love it, but it only has so much-" she placed her hands over her mouth again, unable to go on. "I love it, Charles."

Charles looked absolutely thrilled. "I'm glad! Everything here is free for you to read. Anything you like."

"Anything?" Some of the books looked so old that they may crumble to dust if so much as looked at.

"Anything," Charles said firmly. "Don't worry about a thing. And feel free to come here anytime you like, as much as you like. I meant it when I said the place is ours."

Marianne was bouncing on her feet, unable to stop smiling as she looked around. This whole place, and she was free to look at all of it. There were books she had never even heard of or had never dreamed of being able to find herself, and they were all there for _ her. _

"You can stay here, if you'd like," Charles offered, smiling at the sight of her so happy. "You can finish the tour later. Erik wanted everyone to start training later, but feel free to stay here instead."

Marianne looked around, fingers twitching, ready to pull a book off the shelf and lose herself to it-

She closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and opened them. "No, this can wait - we have to train, that's why we are here, after all."

Charles tilted his head. "It's not a problem if you want to stay here. And we can always start training tomorrow, since it has been a long day for everyone. Really."

Marianne shook her head. "No, it's fine. I can come back later, when the training is done." She hurried back to Charles, not looking back at what she was leaving, and ignored the way Charles looked concerned at her change in attitude. She smiled at Charles. "But Charles, thank you for showing me this."

He smiled. "Not a problem. I want to make sure everyone enjoys their time here, as much as possible. I knew this would make you happy."

And Marianne realized maybe she had misjudged him. Maybe he still acted like a privileged prick at times, maybe he made poor decisions, but he had personally shown her the library because he wanted her to be happy. He wanted all of them to be happy. Someone who opened his home to others, who had listened to her worries and tried to help assuage them, wanted other people to be happy, showed happiness when they were happy - someone like that couldn't be as bad as she had first assumed.

Before Charles turned to lead them out of the library, she rushed forward and hugged him. He instinctively hugged her back but seemed surprised, if the way he took a small step back was any indication. He laughed, likely out of surprise at her sudden show of affection.

"What's this for?" He asked before she let him go, leaving a hand on his shoulder.

"For your hospitality," she said. "And your kindness."

Charles huffed out a startled chuckle and gave what might have been a shy smile. "It's nothing."

"No, it is not," she said firmly. "Thank you." She squeezed his shoulder and they walked out of the library, back down the way they had come from.

"While we're alone," Charles began after a moment, "I would like to... apologize." At her look, he continued, meeting her eyes, "When we first met, I scared you without meaning to. And I put pressure on you to join us. Even after joining us, you held some resentment towards me." He stopped, and she stopped too. He looked sincerely apologetic. "I understand why, and I'm sorry."

She really had misjudged him, hadn't she?

"Thank you for your apology," she said. "I appreciate it."

Charles looked relieved at her response.

"How are we training?" She asked as they passed the study where they had split from the group. "Individually?"

"Individually," Charles said. "Everyone has such different powers, it would be a struggle to give everyone the focus they needed if we all trained together. Erik and you have similar enough powers, though, so perhaps you two can train together. I'm going to be helping everyone, of course, since I've already perfected what I can do." He smoothed his hair back as though trying to show off.

Marianne laughed. "Perhaps you could learn some different languages, since that seems to be a barrier for you," she teased him, remembering their first encounter.

"If you'd let me, I could go through your mind and learn French that way," he said, pointing at her head. "Would be a lot easier."

"If I can learn a language the hard way, so can you." She shook her head, though she was still chuckling. "Besides, you would want to stay out of my head if you knew what was in there."

"Can't be any worse than what I've seen from other people," he said, though concern flashed in his eyes for a second.

"Like who?"

Charles didn't answer immediately and instead studied a painting they passed. Taking the hint, Marianne asked, "What have you seen in my mind already?"

"I've seen your power," he said, "obviously. I've seen your husband, some of your memories of him, and I saw his death."

Marianne flinched.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have said that," Charles said quickly, reaching out and holding her arm, trying to comfort her. She just nodded. "He seemed like a good man."

"He was," she said quietly. She glanced up at another painting, where a couple were dancing in an empty ballroom. The ache in her heart she had grown accustomed to over the years grew a little stronger.

"I saw other things, too," Charles continued, giving her arm a gentle squeeze. She looked away from the painting. "I missed Henry, of course. But I saw pieces of your childhood. Your parents, siblings, the bookstore you loved as a child, things like that. Enough to tell me who you were."

She nodded. If he hadn't seen Henry, then he likely hadn't seen what she hadn't wanted him to see. "What training are we doing tonight?" She didn't want to talk about what he knew of her any longer.

"Erik and Moira want to cover some self-defence. Nothing major for tonight, after everything that's happened."

Marianne nodded again.

"Speaking of which," Charles said, "I'll have to find you all some training clothes, since none of you have anything other than what you're wearing."

Marianne squinted at him. "What kind of training clothes."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This movie is kind of hard to write for because not a lot happens in it? Like Shaw attacks the CIA facility about halfway through the movie, then there's a training montage that takes place over a week, then the final fight. And I don't want to do a flash-forward or a time skip because I want bonding scenes and friendships to grow and characters to be fleshed out. So we're going to see how long a week lasts in this fic.
> 
> Basically if you're here for the plot and not for people bonding then... I don't know, wait until the plot comes back, whenever that happens.
> 
> Hope you liked this chapter! Don't be shy, leave a kudos and/or a comment, please.


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